Dang. I was crazy nervous about posting the last chapter but I am thrilled with the response! Thank you all so much for reading and recing and reviewing. I love hearing what you all think. So thanks for all the reviews.
Anyway, this chapter kinda got away from me. It's a wee bit long but explains some more about where the hell Bella's been that last two years.
Also, I should really be finishing my term paper on comparing the effect of Nazi occupation on the Jews of Poland and the Jews in France. Finishing this may effect my grade! So you should probably review.
Enjoy.
January 2, 2011
"Dude, really?" booms Emmett from outside my apartment door. "Are you really not going to let us in?"
I just scowl at the door and continue to sip my beverage. This time I didn't even bother with a mixer. Frankly, I don't even know why I found the glass necessary. I have literally been drowning my woes for the last few hours, once I ran out of schoolwork to keep my mind occupied.
"Little twin." Alice's voice now. "Just open the door. No one has heard from you in two days! We are worried. Seriously, Edward at least grunt or something to let us you are not dead in your own vomit."
Perhaps if I just stay silent, they will think I'm not home.
"And we know you are fucking home," she continues. "I talked to Ben as he was leaving the building. So unless you jumped out a window—"
"Shit, Ali," interrupts Emmett. "Don't give him any ideas. OW!"
"Don't even joke about that, asshole!" yells Alice. "Our little brother is in there and he is majorly hurting."
This is why I don't want to let them in. If I let them in there will be talking, and the last thing I want to do is talk. I just want to be left alone with my bottle of Jack.
"I know!" replies Emmett. "I fucking know!"
"You don't really know. You were passed the fuck out when all this shit went down. You didn't see him face when we found out about…" She trails off, and I grimace, finishing my drink and taking another right out of the whiskey bottle.
"Believe me, I heard all about it from Rose," says Emmett.
"Oh, don't even get me started on Rose." Alice spits out the name with a surprising amount of venom. "That was a real nice way for Edward to find out. She really broke it to him easy."
"Alice, lay off. I've talked to her about it. She was drunk as shit, and has had a real hard time keeping it a secret for all these years. It really ate at her."
"Well maybe she should have fucking said something, oh, I don't know, about two fucking years ago! Doesn't that seem like a opportune time to speak up, Emmett?"
I think about turning up Tchaikovsky's Symphony No. 6 in B minor Op. 74, Pathétique, to drown them out, but that would require standing. I don't have the energy for anything other than drinking heavily.
"She was in a difficult position," Emmett defends. "Plus it wouldn't have changed anything. She would have still been gone, and Edward would have been even more miserable."
"Oh, kinda like he is now?" Alice counters.
"We don't know how he is," Emmett replies. I can tell by the strain in his voice that he is quickly losing patients with our sister. "He won't open the door."
"Whatever," snaps big twin. "Rosalie is a fucking coward for blurting it out like that and then refusing to come here and help us fix it. As far as I'm concerned, its half her fault anyway."
"Oh, yeah," yells Emmett, obviously pissed now. "Let's blame my girlfriend for being honest. It certainly isn't the fault of the girl who left to abort Edward's kid!"
And now I'm no my feet, tottering over to the door in rage. They are forcing me to think about it, and I can't think about it.
"Bella fucked the fuck up," continues Emmett just as I rip the door open. Unfortunately, I use too much force and forget to let go of the doorknob so I swing away with it, falling over into a potted plant.
"Don't fucking say 'er name!" I slur up at my siblings, taking in the sudden change in my position with bemusement.
They gape don't at me in shock, still frozen in the entryway.
I struggle along to remove myself from the plant, but am unable to do so. Emmett finally snaps out of it and leans down to pull me to my feet. Once he has me right sided, I yank my arm out of his grasp and march back over to my couch and my Jack. I take another long draw, and I hear the door shut behind me.
"Holy mother of pearl," yells Alice. "Are you drunk?"
Without turning to face her I just shrug and collapse face first onto the sofa.
"Dude," says Emmett with concern. "It's not even two in the afternoon. What are you thinking?"
"Nothin' else to do," I explain, flipping over onto my back and stretching out. "Finish all my school shit but my brain won't turn off. Drivin' me crazy!"
"That's why were here," says Alice, kneeling next to me and taking my hand as I look on in horror. Her face just oozes sympathy and pity, two things I don't need from her. I've got plenty of it for myself. "We'll talk the whole thing out, big twin. Don't worry."
Usually Alice and I are so in sync. The whole twin thing must be malfunctioning because talk is the last thing I want to do.
So instead of speaking, I guzzle unhealthy amounts of whiskey before handing the bottle to Alice.
"Edward," she admonishes. "You are going to be miserable in a couple hours."
"Already there, big twin," I slur. "If ya aren't gonna drink it pass it."
"I'm not drinking it! I'm here to talk to you! Help you feel better," she insists, scowling at me now.
"No whiskey for you," I reply, snatching it out of her hand. "Em?" I say, offering it to my brother. I grin when he accepts and takes a sip, grimacing as he does so.
"That aboy," I say as I give him a salute.
"Edward," Alice tries again, really exasperated now. "Please stop this madness. Let's talk."
"Hell no," I declare. "This is a no talky zone."
"But—"
"Nope," I say. "None of that. You can join me in a drink but you can't talk."
Alice looks to Emmett who shrugs before sighing heavily and nodding.
"Just one drink," Alice replies, moving to the kitchen to get glasses.
"I told you to be patient, I told you to be fine." An hour later Emmett and I sit side by on the floor with our backs against the couch, power singing alone with the Bon Iver emenating softly from my MacBook. "I told you to be balanced, I told you to me kind."
We slur our words and my head rests on Emmett shoulder while me softly sing and watch Alice twirl around the room. She has a mostly empty bottle of one hand and hasn't opened her eyes in at least fifteen minutes. Alice spins languidly around the room, like some sort of haunting ballerina figurine from a child's jewelry box. My eyes follow big twin's movements as I continue to sing with my brother.
"Come on skinny love, what happened here," we sing, Emmett terribly off key.
"Yah know," he says, breaking all the rules about talking. I lift my head in an attempt to scowl at him, but I'm sufficiently wasted at this point and can't find it in me to care. "Skinny, skinny love. You know who is skinny?"
"B… Bella?" I venture, hiccupping slightly.
"Yup. Skinny, skinny Bella."
"She's skinny because there is no baby in there," I say, allowing my heavy head to flop back to his shoulder.
"No baby no where," Emmett agrees, sounding almost as sad as I do.
"Gone baby, gone," I mutter.
"Hey!" yells Alice, rounding on us and basically falling into my side. I open my eyes to stare at her, but everything is fuzzy, so I close one to bring her frowning face into focus. "This shit is against the rules. No talking."
"I'm just sayin'," continues Emmett, ignoring the short one while I steal her bottle of one and drain it in one long gulp. "Has anyone actually talked to her."
"Nope," replies Alice, shaking her head. The short spikes of her hair poke me in the good eye, so I can't see all over again. "Edward?"
"Nope," I say.
"I can't believe she hasn't tried to talk to you," mutters Emmett. "To at least try to explain. You deserve to know what happened. What a bitch."
I think about yelling at him for that, but I refrain. "She's called," I slur, gesturing vaguely in the direction of where I left my phone in the kitchen. "But I can't."
"Maybe this is a miscommunication," whimpers Alice, sounding like she is really crying now. I can't tell for certain because I can't see. "Maybe she can explain it away. I want it to be a miscommunication."
"Its not," I say. "It explains everything. I understand why she left now at least."
"Oh, Edward!" Alice sobs. This pity is back and the rule must be reinstated.
"No talking!" I demand. Alice, for once in our lives, keeps her mouth shut, and we go back to the singing. We sit there, on the floor and against my couch, singing quietly to Death Cab, Iron & Wine, and Damian Rice. It's highly depressing, and I think Alice is still crying. I'm on the verge of sleep when the pounding on my front door starts against.
"Bella?" I ask when I am jolted into reality by the nose, confused from a combination of sleep and alcohol.
"What the hell is going on in there?" demands a familiar voice from the hallway that prompts Alice to squeak and sprint toward the door. She throws it open and hurls herself into Jasper's arms.
"Jazz!" she sobs, her little body shaking as she cries. "Don't ever leave me."
Jasper blinks at her in shock before carrying her into the apartment and shutting the door behind him. He lifts Alice higher, her little feet dangling listlessly as he strokes her hair.
"Baby," he coos. "What has your brother gotten in this pretty little head of yours? I will never leave you. I wouldn't last two minutes on my own, plus I love you too damn much."
She hiccups as nods, loosening the grasp she has on his neck as he sets her back on her feet. Jazz keeps big twin in the crook of his arm as he leads her to sit on a love seat opposite Emmett and I.
"What the fuck is going on?" he demands, glaring at us as Alice continues to calm down. "They came up here hours ago to make sure you were okay!"
"'m not," I reply.
"I can see that," Jasper says, shaking his head and surveying the collection of empty liquor bottles on the side table. "Seriously, is this apartment some sort of black hole for cell service? You two disappeared hours ago and were supposed to be home hours ago and not one of you has the decency to answer your phone!"
"Fuck," mutters Emmett, lumbering to his feet and searching under pillows for his cell. "Rose is going to kill me."
"Yeah she is," agrees Jazz. "I was sent here to make sure nothing terrible happened and to bring you two back to Boulder. "
"Leaving so soon?" I inquire. "But the party is just gettin' started. Drink?"
"No, we all have to get to work in the morning," Jasper replies, shaking his head at me again. "Not all of us have another week off before getting' back to the real world."
"Oh Jasper," I say with a sigh. "Believe me, I'm in the fucking real world. And it sucks, thus my offer of a drink."
"Please, Jazz?" Alice whispers, blinking her big, wet eyes up at her husband. "Lets stay for a little while longer. Little twin doesn't want to be alone."
"Fine," Jasper aggress, sighing heavily. "Just one drink."
An alarm is ringing on the periphery of my dream, and I instinctually reach out for Bella. Already, I'm used to sharing a bed with her again, and in my half awake state, I'm really upset that I'm not touching her. I search for her, not out of sexual desire but the need for the comfort her warmth offers.
I love her. I need her.
But when I do finally locate Bella in my bed, something is off. Instead of smooth skin and the shivers, all I feel is massive muscle, and even more disturbing, hair.
"If it's gay is it still incest?" a voice asks. My eyes fly open and I take in the sigh on my hand grasping Emmett's hair man calf. I glance down to the foot of the bed where I see my brother, propped up on one elbow and staring at me with bleary eyes.
And then I remember everything and really wish I were still asleep. Or drunk.
"Sorry, Em," I croak out, releasing his leg and rolling over onto my back. I scrub my hands over my face before glancing at the clock. "What the fuck? It's six o'clock in the fucking morning! Why the fuck am I awake right now?"
"Guess at some point I had the where with all to set the alarm on my phone," Emmett explains, fusing with his cell and thankfully silencing the piercing alarm. "I gotta go to work."
"How did we end up in bed together?" I ask, closing my eyes again because the little bit of light of Emmett's phone is too bright for my eyes to handle.
"I have no fucking clue," replies Emmett with a groan. "But it's fucking pathetic. I would much rather be at home with my girlfriend than sharing a bed with my baby brother."
Bella is also at that home of which Emmett speaks. And I will never be able to crawl into bed with her again without hating myself after.
"I think I need another drink," I mutter.
"Don't be like that, dude," says Emmett as he gets out of bed. I open one eye and see that he is only in his boxers.
"Why aren't you wearing pants?" I demand.
"I never wear pants to bed, bro," he says, pulling on the garment in question. "And neither do you."
I quickly take stock and see that I am also pantsless.
"Get your lazy ass out of bed," he demands, throwing my pants in my face. "I can't figure out your fancy coffee contraption."
"It's a French press," I mutter, but I get out of bed anyway because my brother is an idiot and I know he will break my press. Those things aren't cheap
Wincing as the light hits our eyes, Emmett and I stumble out of my room. Alice and Jasper are curled together on my couch, and Emmett throws a pillow at them.
"Fuck!" shouts Jazz, sitting up as Alice groans face down in the sofa. "Oh, two fast. My head." Jasper lays his head back down.
"Are you hung over?" I ask, not remember him having more than a drink or two. But there is really not a lot that I remember at all about last night.
"Yeah," Jazz replies. "Fuck all of you for pouring booze down my throat, and fuck you Edward for making the vibe in here so depressing that its impossible to not drink."
"You can think Bella for that one when we get home," says Em causing my whole body to tense.
"Remember the rules, Emmett?" I demand.
"Yeah, yeah, sorry bro. Coffee now!"
The circus clears out of my apartment half an hour later, and I go back to bed. When I wake up around three in the afternoon, I realize that I have absolutely nothing to do so I start drinking all over again.
January 6, 2011
"Edward! You open this door right now!" I groan as the banging interrupts my drunken brooding, and I flip towards the back of the couch, burying my face in a cushion.
Why can't the people just leave me alone?
"I mean it, Edward!" the voice continues to yell. "No ones heard form you in a week! Ben says whenever he's home you don't leave your room and we start school in two days!"
"Go the fuck away," I growl out, tossing a book in the general direction of the front door.
"Let me in! I'm not going anywhere."
After five more minutes of endless pounding, I drag my sorry ass off the couch and stumble blindly toward the door. Ignoring the incessant thumping is exhausting so I throw it open to see Tia. I glare at her, and she glares right back before pushing past me, entering the apartment. Grumbling incoherently, I decide to ignore her presence and make my way back to my couch. I like my couch. It demands nothing from me and always tells the truth.
Every time I see my couch, there is no risk of some new horrifying fact to become known, effectively destroying me.
"What happened to you?" Tia asks, apparently appalled at my state. Which is valid seeing as I haven't showered in a week and have been drunk so often that the alcohol is basically seeping out of my pours.
I shrug my shoulders and recline comfortably against a pillow.
"You smell terrible. No wonder Ben has been basically living at Angela's," Tia says, taking in the dump that is my apartment. Normally, I'm a neat freak. Normally, I can't stand clutter or dirty dishes. But times are not normal. Nothing is going to be normal again because Bella did something terrible to our baby.
"Don't particularly care," I mumble.
"Are you planning on going to school Monday?" she asks.
"Don't fucking know," I reply, shrugging again.
"Edward!" she says, startled by my language and response, I suppose. "What's gotten into you?"
"I can't talk about it, Tia," I tell her with a sigh. She cautiously approaches me and sits in an armchair by my feet.
"What did she do to you?" Tia asks, sounding livid.
"Perpetually hurting me for the last six years. And I've let her," I whine somewhat pathetically.
"What did she do now?" Tia corrects.
"I'm starting to get a more complete picture of the events prompting her departure," I say, pleased with how scientific and normal I sound. If I can detach myself emotionally from the situation and reason my way through with facts and logic, everything will be all right.
"What do you mean?"
"Well, we started having sex at the very end of freshmen year," I continue, mapping out our relationship, noticing and ignoring Tia's flinch. "We stayed together all of sophomore year, she abandoned me in Forks that summer, and then we got back together at the beginning of junior year. We were together for the rest of junior year and all summer. It was good. There was rarely a night we were apart. We adopted a cat and met each other's parents and shared everything. Or at least I shared everything. She was getting better. She was letting me in, making plans with me, calling me sweetheart. She let me tell her I loved her, didn't freak out when I referred to her in public as my girlfriend. And then right after her twenty-second birthday, her dad died.
"It broke her," I murmur, pinching the bridge of my nose. My mouth won't stop moving, spewing all my thoughts as I drunkenly make connections and try to figure out what I'm feeling. I forget Tia's there at all, and I just talk. "Broke her more. I mean, she was already the most broken person I've ever met, but this… She was a zombie. And I couldn't fix it. And I felt like I was losing her, so I just clung tighter. I pushed for more than she was ready for. Moving in together and putting off grad school to spend more time with her. Well she did not like that at all, and we were fighting more than usual. But she got me a piano for Christmas so she obviously cared for me. I play the piano, by the way."
"Edward—" Tia's attempt to irrupt me is ignored.
"But then she was gone. On New Year's Eve. She kissed me at midnight, and then went outside to smoke a bowl. She didn't come back. Jake found me hours later and told me that she left. She left with… Well, that doesn't even matter.
"I never really understood. I got that she was broken. That her mom abandoned her and her dad died. I got that she didn't want me putting off school for her and that she was scared to take the next step with me, but she'd been living with that for a long time. Sometimes I thought that I made it all up. The way she seemed to need me like she didn't need anyone else. But she's back. She cares. I'm pretty sure she loves me, in her own limited way.
"I get it now," I continue, getting to the part that's still too fresh for me to be emotionally detached. "Last week, on New Year's of course, Rosalie comes home. Drunk and mad. She started screaming at me for letting Bella back into my life. Things escalated and it comes out that… God. I can't even say it."
"Say what, Edward?" I jump a little at the sound of Tia's voice.
"A fact came out, that completely explains her departure. It's the missing piece. All my questions are answered… But now I don't think I can ever forgive her," I say, really believing it for the first time. There will be no recovery from this.
But now I understand. She had to disappear because she didn't want me involved.
She said it herself. She doesn't have the words to make it better because nothing can.
"She cries now, Tia," I say, like that explains something.
"Edward, I want to help you. I hate seeing you so miserable, but I don't know Bella. I don't know anything about your relationship. To be honest, most of what you just said went over my head," she says, leaning over to rest a hand on my shin. Tia looks scared and desperate. Lord, I must be even more of a mess than I even realize.
"There was… she was… we were gonna…"
"Edward, just say it," she says, sounding frustrated.
"A baby," I burst out, feeling slightly like my head is going to explode. "There was a baby… and now there's not."
"What happened to it?" Tia asks quietly, looking stricken and pale.
"I don't know," I admit, feeling nauseous. "There're really only a few options."
"So either…"
"Yeah, I have a kid out there somewhere being raised by people I don't know or…" And that I could really not say. That I could not even think.
"Holy shit."
I snort. Tia cussed.
"I don't know if I should give you this now," she murmurs.
"Give me what?" I ask, lifting my head to study her. She looks jittery, unsure, and decidedly un-Tia like.
"When I got here, I found something sitting on your door mat," she explains.
"What?" I ask again. "Tia, just give it to me."
Sighing heavily, she drops a notebook onto my chest. I glance up at Tia and she shrugs, looking equally as bemused as me. As I pick up it up, understanding dawns. I instantly recognize the Moleskin journal. Bella filled about a thousand of them in the time we were together. She writes everything down. Things she observes, things she feels. I begged, many a time, to read just one entry. The insight such a journal would provide to the inner workings of Bella… is very appealing.
Turning the familiar journal over in my hands, my fingers brush over the post-it note that simply says "READ ME" in block letters that are as familiar as the journal itself.
"It's Bella's," I murmur.
A bundle of post cards, bound by a rubber band, falls out into my lap.
"Thought so," Tia replies.
I flip through the twenty or so post cards, furrowing my brow in confusion. The first is a picture of prairie with the bold word KANORADO. Smiling despite myself, I look at the back.
Adonis (I have found that since my departure, I can't even think your name let alone spell it. Not that you will ever be seeing this because I'll never be sending it),
Can you believe a place exists called KANORADO? Well it does, and its terrible.
I'm sorry. Please don't hate me.
~~Your Isabella.
"What is it?" Tia asks. Still chuckling, I hand her the postcard a move on to the next. "I don't get it."
"It's funny," I reply impatiently. "A combination of Kansas and Colorado? Located on the border? It's funny."
The next is a black and white from Topeka that depicts three flying monkeys and declaring, "Don't mess with Kansas."
Adonis,
Dorothy was a dumbass. Kansas sucks. I bet you could make it better.
~~ Your Isabella
I continue to sort through the cards, smiling at most of them. Most messages are humorous, but obviously miserable. And I don't understand. Bella wanted to leave. She should have been happy and free after finally ditching me. Instead, each message is funny but undeniably sad.
Stops on Bella's road trip include St. Louis, Pittsburg, Baltimore, DC, Charleston, Savannah, Atlanta, Jacksonville, Orlando, Miami, Mobile, New Orleans, Baton Rouge, Dallas, Houston, San Antonio, and Corpus Christi, along with a dozen other tiny towns, most of which I'd never even heard of.
Shit, she really got around. How the hell did she afford that?
On the backs of cards that Bella couldn't conjure a joke or a memory, she simply writes "I miss you." In totally, I got twelve "I miss yous."
"She was thinking about me," I murmur in awe.
"Edward, I still don't get it. Are you okay?" Tia asks, touching my forearm.
"She bought me postcards from everywhere she went. Look, they're all dated. She has mapped out her whole journey. Now I know exactly where she was. It drove me crazy, not knowing." Explaining the obvious to Tia is gratings on my nerves.
"Okay. So this is a good thing?"
"The last one is dated a year ago. She was in Texas. That's the last one. Where the hell has she been for the last year? What the hell?" I continue, ignoring my friend.
"Ah," she says. I open the first page a find a piece of loose leaf, address to me.
Edward,
This is a last resort. I know you hate me right now, and this is the only way I can think of to make you listen. To make you understand. I made a lot of mistakes, but I didn't do what you think I did. If that makes sense.
You always claimed to want to read one of these suckers. So here it is.
Personally, I recommend you only read the first couple entries. They explain what happened that December (mostly). There is a lot of shit in this journal that I am not proud of. It's going to hurt you. If you aren't ready for that, don't keep reading.
But you deserve to know everything. This is pretty much everything.
It's up to you.
I am so sorry. Please call me. We really need to talk.
~~ Your Isabella
"I'm gonna read this now," I say, gesturing to the moleskin and still not looking at Tia. Bella's note makes me ill, but too curious. Of course I am going to read the whole thing. I try to mentally prepare myself for the coming pain, but it can't be much worse than what I've been living with for the last week.
"Okay… I'll go… Just… I'm going to make some tea," Tia says softly, making her way toward the kitchen.
"Okay," I reply, carefully opening to the front page.
January 2, 2009
I am a poor wayfaring stranger
A-traveling thru this world below
But there's no sickness, toil, or danger
In that bright land to which I go
I'm going there to see my Father
I'm going there no more to roam
I'm just a-going over Jordan
I'm just a-going over home
I am a poor wayfaring stranger
A-traveling thru this world below
But there's no sickness, toil, or danger
In that bright land to which I go
I'm going there to see my mother
She said she'd meet me when I come
I'm just a-going over Jordan
I'm just a-going over home
January 22, 2009
Location: Fucking Laurent's fucking smelly ass station wagon.
Mood: Nothing
Music: Melodramatic things, like Death Cab
I haven't written in at least three weeks. I haven't written a single thing since before. That's how I'm conceptualizing things now. Before and after.
I'm firmly in the after, and everything hurts.
The last time I took a hiatus from journaling, I was 16 and I came home to find my house empty and my mother gone. It was my first taste of this magic trick we Swans do. It's a disappearing act.
Renee did it.
My baby did it.
I'm actively doing it.
It's like the universe just said "and now I make these Swan's vanish!" Well done universe. I don't even really know where I am, and neither does anyone that matters.
Miscarriage is such a ugly, clinical word that really does nothing to describe what this feels like.
Writing was once necessary to my survival. I did it daily, and skipping this daily appointment with myself would mean that I would get trapped in my head. Bad things lurk in my head, so I try to spend as little time as possible in there. Typically. But these are dire times, and recording them brings a new and sharp kind of pain to my chest.
All stories start at the beginning, I suppose. And the story of Bella's disappearance begins on New Years Eve. (Actually, it starts a bit before that at the doctors office when I am informed there is no heartbeat. The little thing inside of me, growing for ten weeks no longer had a heart beat. But I can't write about that now.)
He who must not be named- no that's not right, it's more like he-who-I-literally-can't name – was so fucking happy. I've been drowning all semester, but he didn't want to see it, and I didn't want him to see it so no one did any seeing.
Anyway, right after midnight I had to leave. The festive atmosphere and happy him was making it impossible for me to breathe. I don't understand the happy people. Before Charlie died and my baby vanished, I was starting to see. But bad things happen to bad people, so logically I must be terrible.
I needed air and whilst I was getting said air, I ran into James, my dear old coke buddy.
He analyzed the look in my face so accurately, I couldn't help but agree to leave with him. To be honest, I didn't even fucking think about it at all.
"Do you want to get away from it all, Isabella?" he asked.
"Give me an hour to gather my shit," I replied.
So that's how I ended up fulfilling my destiny as a Swan woman and disappearing. I thought about leaving him a note, but that was just a little too Renee-like. And I was already acting obscenely like my motherfucking mother, and an "I'm sorry" note was just too much.
He deserves more. And that's why I left. Because I can't give him what he deserves.
I can't keep writing. This is my first entry in a month and I've already emotionally vomited all over this brand new Moleskin.
I wonder if he knows that I've left my heart with him.
January 25, 2009
Better never to have met you in my dream than to wake and reach for hands that are not there ~ Otomo No Yakamochi
Saw this written on my bathroom stall wall. I think that's why I've been doing so many drugs recently, to avoid such dreams.
February 5, 2009
Time: 9:48 PM
Location: The Dirty South
Mood: Apocalyptic
Music: Anything whiney.
For the first time since I learned how to spell my name, writing it down doesn't make me feel better. Nothing will make me feel better.
I made my choice. I left him. And even if it's for his own good, it doesn't make it hurt any less.
I've been living at a low level of inner turmoil pretty much since I learned to know better. Ever since I can remember, I've felt uncomfortable in my own skin. Like I would rather be anyone else. After Charlie died, I didn't think I could get any worse.
As usual, I was wrong. I'm also perpetually wrong.
I left town with James. Probably not the smartest decision, given his history with drugs and assault, but this choice more than anything indicates how beyond caring I am for my own wellbeing. I'm not scared of James. He's the kind of man I should be with anyway. James is everything he's not.
James is boring. Stupid. Goalless. Blond.
He is…
I don't even have the words.
And now for an analogy! James is to Bella as he is to… I don't even know. Kate. But he tried to date Kate, and I ruined that before it even started with a little well-timed fallacio.
I bet he's suffering. Probably even more than me. I am mentally prepared for the worst, but he expects the best. He is probably suffering, and he doesn't even know the worst of it. That's the second reason I left. So he would never have to know the worst of it.
So to recap. I left because:
1. He deserves better. He wants happily ever after with the wife and the kids and the successful surgeon career. He was putting his life on hold to be with me, and it couldn't continue.
2. The worst of it was killing me. Eventually, he would have noticed that I'm basically dead inside. He would force me to tell him the worst of it and then he would be dead inside too. I couldn't live with myself if he went dead inside.
There's probably more reasons, like me being Renee's daughter and all that, but I'm too exhausted to write that now.
James and Laurent want to go out to some hick bar tonight. It's the perfect distraction, so I'll go with them. But I would rather be with him. I would always rather be with him.
February 12, 2009
Time: Don't fuckin' know.
Location: It's a mystery
Mood: Also, don't fuckin' know
Today something weird happened.
James tried to talk to me. Like really talk to me. About him. And my relationship with him. And what happened with him and how I feel about him.
Him is now officially a banned subject. Violating the ban results in the punishment of being pushed out of the moving vehicle.
Eventually it's got to get easier, right?
February 17, 2009
Time: 2:11 Pm
Location: On a Highway to Hell
Mood: Exhausted
Music: Jerry Garcia, Jeff Grisham
I hate road trips. When I was little, my whole life was like a road trip. Renee dragged me around the country, and although I saw a shit ton, mostly I was just bored. It's the same now, except I volunteered for this.
Because I'm an idiot.
These stupid, masochistic cocksuckers won't even let me drive. Laurent thinks I'm too emotionally unstable. James just enjoys pissing me the fuck off.
Idiots.
The South is just trees. Evergreens and deciduous. Also kudzu. A lot of kudzu and rednecks and Confederate flags. I can't sense any of him in this part of the country. I keep thinking that each day away from him will make it easier, but it turns out the opposite is true.
Some days, I don't utter a single word. I think the boys are disappointed in my lack of ability to entertain them. My expectations are pretty much met with them. They're completely unoriginal. James spends half his time trying to get in my pants and the other half trying to get me high.
He has yet to succeed at the former. I can't say the same about the later.
Before last month, I could count the number of times in recent memory I didn't share a bed with him on one fucking hand. For at least year and a half, we spent every night together. And now I can't sleep. But part of the not sleeping thing could have to do with the fact that my bed is now the back of an ancient station wagon.
I think it's more about the empty though. My bed is empty. My heart is empty. My womb is empty. I'm empty. Empty. Empty. Empty. Empty.
Gah. I'm so emo, I'm annoying myself. This is why I don't talk to Laurent and James. I will probably kill my fellow road trippers with my emo.
The South is hot, and basically another country. The rednecks look at me like an exotic zoo animal. And their pot is shitty.
It's been more than entire month since I've seen him.
Empty.
February 20, 2009
"I was never one to patiently pick up broken fragments and glue them together again and tell myself that the mended whole was as good as new. What is broken is broken - and I'd rather remember it as it was at its best than mend it and see the broken places as long as I lived." ~ Marrgaret Mitchell
I hate identifying with fucking Scarlett O'Hara because she is one nasty bitch, but her words ring true. Gone with the Wind seems an apt book to read on my journey through the south.
The problem, Ms. O'Hara, is that I was never particularly good, even at my best.
March 1, 2009
Time: 6:09 PM
Location: The Sunshine State
Mood: Embarrassed
Music: Beach Boys, perhaps?
So we all are well aware of how much I hate showing weakness, right? Right.
Well, today I showed a whole lot of it to James and it wasn't unbearably terrible.
Everything started when James threw me in a pool, and I almost drown like a fucking rat.
I'm not a strong swimmer. There is not a whole lot of water in home sweet Colorado, nor did Renee ever bother to put me in proper swimming lessons as a kid. I can usually manage a doggie paddle, but I pretty much fucking terrified of bodies of water deeper than waist level.
So when James shocks the piss out of my dumping me in the deep end, I panic and flap my limbs futilely. I gulp in lungs full of H2O and am pretty convinced that I'm going to die.
My last thought was that if I knew I was going to die so young I would have spent all my time with him rather than wasting my time with learning shit and shit.
Although it felt like eons at the time, I was really only under for a matter of seconds until James realized his mistake and jumped in after me. His muscled arms came around me, and I latched mine around his neck in, squeezing for dear life. Sputtering and coughing, glorious, life-sustaining air filled my lungs. James walked towards slightly shallower water, standing to his fall height with me in my arms.
"Ease up, Bella," wheezed, pulling gently on my arms. I realized that I was basically strangling him and slightly loosened my death grip. I did not open my eyes. My heart was still racing, and even though they were the wrong arms, James was still providing protection.
Except for the face he fucking threw me in the first place. Cocksucker.
"You can open your eyes now, fish girl," he said with a laugh.
"You are such a motherfucker, James," I muttered into his neck, blinking up at him. I was still shaking a bit from the lingering fear of near drowning, and my punch to his shoulder was pretty damn lame. "You almost fucking killed me."
"Relax." I could feel his chuckle deep in his chest. And it was shocking pleasant to be held close again. "I wasn't gonna let you die."
I simply growled in response.
"Isn't the water nice now that you're in it?" he asked, swinging me back and forth across the surface of the water.
"I guess." I tried to be petulant but couldn't help smile a little. The water was fucking pleasant.
Then he spun us it a super quick circle, causing me to shriek and giggle and cling more desperately to him for fear of drowning. That was probably his plan all along.
"So Bella Swan can't swim, huh?" he mused, sinking down in the water to his shoulder but still keeping my head above water. He chose this moment, when I was totally helpless and dependent on him for survival, to basically grope me in the water.
I should have minded more. But it was kinda nice, letting someone else keep my head above water.
"Seriously, I'm fucking surprised," he continued. "I thought you could do anything. Indestructible."
"I can swim!" I defended, still not letting go of him. "Sorta. Just not well."
"You're scared of the water!" he declared, getting joy out of my weakness. The asshole.
"Am not! I'm going to be a great fucking swimmer. Starting now."
"You're going to have to let go of me first." His arms loosened their grip, compelling me to move closer. "Do you want me to teach you?"
"Who the fuck are you? Is James Hunt really offering to do something nice for someone else? I'm shocked," I replied.
"Don't be a bitch. I could drop you, you know. Your life is in my hands." I knew he was manipulating me into pressing myself against him, but I did it anyway.
"Do you really know what your doing?" I asked, raising an eyebrow in skepticism
"Sure. Everyone knows the first step to learning to swim is floating."
So I floated. James was obviously lovin' it because for once I was letting him touch me at his leisure. I was actually impressed with his ability to hold back. He only groped my ass twice.
Still, eventually I became comfortable enough in the water to float on my own for a couple minutes.
At one point, as I stared up and James as I floated in the water, I became pretty positive that he was on the verge of kissing me. His lips were closing in on mine and he had that lusty look I've seen on the faces of a thousand boys. But even more shocking than all that, for a moment I thought about letting him. Kiss me, that is.
"I best not get herpes from this dank ass cheap motel pool water," I mused to deliberately ruin the moment.
"Yeah that would fucking suck because there are much more pleasurable ways to get herpes," he replied. "Wanna give it a go?"
Chuckling and shaking my head, my feet found the stairs and I exited the pool. "And now you've ruined it!" I called over my shoulder, wrapping myself in a scratchy towel.
"Aw, baby, your body's too hot to cover up with a towel."
I flip him off as I make my way back to our room.
"Way to ruin our moment, Swan!"
"We don't have moments, Hunt!"
Maybe at the next hotel, we'll tackle treading water.
March 22, 2009
Time: 8:11 AM
Location: The Home of Walt Disney
Mood: Pensive
Music: I don't fucking know… A Dream is a Wish Your Heart Makes?
It's taken us more than two months to reach our final destination, but we did it. A girlfriend of Laurent's owns a gorgeous house on three acres of land sitting on a fucking lake five minutes from Disneyworld. She is letting us stay her in exchange for some manual labor. The boys are building her a guesthouse while I'm working in her garden.
Every night, I walk down to the dock and can see the fireworks from the theme parks. Their colors are reflected on the glassy surface of the water.
It's a perfect spot, but all I can think about is him and the worst of it. He has always had a weird obsession with fire, and I know he would love this.
The house is big, but has only one guest bedroom that James and I are supposed to be sharing. Last night, I let him kiss me with his tongue and feel me up a little bit, but then I made him go sleep on the couch.
"You're gonna succumb to my charms eventually, Swan," he said, smiling ruefully before slipping out the bedroom door.
Unfortunately, he's probably right. The more time passes since I've seen him, the more like the old Bella I become. I will probably end up fucking James at some point because I can't think of any reason not too. We're already done everything else anyway, even if it was a really long time ago.
This dock, even in the daylight, is almost perfect. I like the water. When I'm near the water I can almost forgive Florida for being mountainless.
Most mornings, I wake up before the sun, discombobulated from lack of him and mountains. Without both of them, I have no compass.
I just jumped in the water. Notice the water droplets? They dripped down onto my paper from my hair and off my nose. That's kinda cool, huh? Even cooler is I'm not scared now. All the treading and the floating paid off. Being able to jump into a big, temperate body of water. Nothing like Boulder Creek.
And just like that, all the little joy I managed to squeeze out of this bright, sun shinny morning, is gone.
Here's a happy memory to go along with my happy mood.
January 1st, we drove through eastern Colorado. I hate eastern Colorado. There are no mountains. It might as well be Kansas. I spent hours staring out the back window of the station wagon, eye fixated on the mountains. My hands started shaking, and I felt myself freaking out the moment they disappeared.
"Bye, bye Colorado," Laurent said sometime later when we passed the "Entering Kansas" sign at the state line.
"Stop," I said, completely panicking.
"What?" James asked, turning around to get a good look at my probably green face. Riding in the back seat has always made me carsick, but I think this bout of nausea ran deeper than that.
"STOP!" I yelled again. "I'm going to puke. Please, let me out!"
Laurent complied, muttering about me being a crazy bitch under his breath. I basically tumbled out of the car before it reached a complete stop. I got about ten feet off the side of the road, tottering on unsteady legs, until they gave out completely. I fell forward onto my knees as my whole body shook and heaved. Somewhere someone was crying, and it took me a minute to realize it was me. I touched my face in surprise, utterly perplexed to find my eyes leaking.
I don't cry.
Not when Renee left.
Not when Charlie died.
Not when the worst of it happened.
But there I was, sobbing hysterically and my body shaking. I glanced fifty yards down the two-lane highway, spotting the "Entering Kansas" sign.
I'm not in Colorado now. Home is really far away, and I'm empty.
I was fucking Kansas with a coke dealer and his equally creepy friend. So I puked. I emptied the entire contents of my stomach while James laughed and Laurent cursed James out for bringing a "crazy, puking chick".
But eventually, I got a grip. James handed me a water bottle and a stick of gum as I followed the boys back to the car.
"Your girl's a weird one," Laurent said when we got back underway. Apparently my silence had prompted him to talk about me like I wasn't there.
"Not my girl," James said, leering at me in the rearview. I closed my eyes and pretend I was anywhere else. "Yet."
Laurent let out a laugh. "You sure can pick 'um," he continued. "Why doesn't she talk?"
"She talks," James insisted. "Don't you, Swan?"
I flipped them off and took a nap.
And now I'm in Orlando, Florida. I don't know how long I'll be here.
April 4, 2009
I'd rather be a hammer than a nail
~ Simon and Garfunkel
April 19, 2009
Story idea: something involving Mormons and robots. A satire clearly demonstrating that love is all really just bullshit. Nothing is worth this kind of pain.
May 22, 2009
Time: 3:37 AM
Location: Under a streetlite bye the see
Mood: Dissgusted
Music: Fuck this music thing. No music has spoken to me since I left him.
I fuked James.
I fucked James on som towels on the beach 20 minutes ago. He feel asleep immediately and I can't sop crying.
I dunk. Too much as is the usual thees one is sirprized by my behavior. But it makes me fell empty. Er.
I wunder wat he's doin right this very minute. I hope he's okay. I'll I know, is that he is better whereever hes without me than he would be hear wit me.
June 23, 2009
Drunkenness is temporary suicide.
~Bertrand Russell, The Conquest of Happiness
July 4, 2009
Time: 10:09 PM
Location: The back of a hippie van
Mood: Resigned
I never told him, but I have a lot of money now. Well, to him it probably wouldn't be a lot of money, but to me it is. When Charlie died he left me his house and his life savings. Which amounts to about twenty-five thousand dollars. The first thing I did after the funeral was attempt to partially pay Phil back for college. He wouldn't take a penny, of course, and we got into a huge fight over it.
I guess I'm even more thankful now for Phil's extreme and unfounded generosity. He's probably regretted his kindness now that it turns out that I'm just a younger, less attractive version of my mother.
I didn't touch any of Charlie's hard earned money until I left Boulder. He would probably hate what his life savings is funding. But at least now everyone understands just how unlovable and useless I am.
Anyway, that's how I'm doing it. I'm living off Charlie's inheritance. I don't really eat that much or live anywhere specific, so my expenses really only include booze, gas, pot, and cigarettes. Every time I spend money on something Charlie wouldn't like, I can feel a little chip of my soul disintegrating. Eventually, there won't be anything left.
I just don't know how to stop.
James and I are back on the highway. We bopped around Florida for a couple months, hitchhiking. We saw the beach and the glades and the Gulf. Occasionally, we fuck but mostly he is my friend. Sort of. He annoys the shit out of me and is a complete moron, but he makes me laugh. He's easy. Interacting with James requires absolutely no thought.
James and I somehow managed to get temp jobs working with these grizzled, old, backwoods, gator dudes thirty miles outside Miami. They smoke like chimneys and have thick southern accents and they give airboat rides to tourists. For a couple weeks we worked the cash register, selling tickets, stocking stuffed gator heads, and cooking fired gator that tastes just like chicken. Ed, the owner, let us sleep in a loft above the gift shop.
That's where we met Maggie and Liam. How they ended up traveling the US in a VW Bus is unclear to me, probably because their Irish accents are thicker than Ed's southern drawl, but I'm glad they did. The four of us got to talking and the next thing I know, we're heading towards Texas.
Maggie is hilarious and has excellent taste in music and pot. Liam doesn't really speak, much like myself, but he lets me drive his van after I told him about my beast of a truck back home.
We're headed toward Austin, which makes me happy because I've heard the city is Boulder-cool.
"So what's the deal with you an' James?" Maggie asked me last night as we lounged in the bed at the back of the van.
"No deal," I told her, accepting the bong she handed me. I don't know how they manage to always have such good weed on hand. This bus must be magic.
"Oh, come off it," she said, playfully shoving me in the shoulder. "There's got to be a story 'bout how you an' that boy ended up sellin' tickets in the everglades."
"Well there's got to be a story with you too!" I replied, shoving her back. "You and Liam in this van in Florida do not make sense."
"You first," she insists. "An' no lying. I always know when people lie."
"James is a distraction," I said, blowing out a large smoke ring. Maggie reached up and flicked it, causing the vapor to curl. I love the look of smoke. "My whole life is a distraction. And not even a very good one. We drunkenly fucked once months ago, and it was terrible. He's just my slightly creepy, rather annoying travel companion."
"Ah, so the thing you need distracting from is the real story, then," she replied with a chuckle. Maggie is very perceptive apparently.
"Yeah," I admitted. "Bad things kept happening, and I was the common denominator. I ran away to keep more bad things from happening to ones that love me. "
"You look so sad all the time," Maggie murmured.
That's probably because I am sad all the time.
"Small price to pay," I dismissed with a wave of my hand. "This is for the best. I'm a poor, wayfaring stranger. Now you go."
"You're a terrible storyteller," Maggie declared. In this moment, she's right but I can't even write his name in these pages, let alone tell her the whole story. There is no way to explain most of what I feel anyway.
It turns out that Maggie is a great storyteller. She weaved a romantic tale of love against the odds. Liam is older, her former professor at the university. Her filthy rich parents do not approve, so they ran away after she graduated. Liam has always been fascinated by the US apparently so here they are. They want to see it all before finding somewhere to settle down.
I almost cry when I see the look on Maggie's face when she looks at Liam.
I like Maggie, but she's right. I am not happy, nor do I have any plans to actually change that.
August 11, 2009
Of all the money that ere I had, I spent it in good company.
And of all the harm that ere I've done, alas was done to none but me.
And all I've done for want of wit, to memory now I cannot recall.
So fill me to the parting glass. Goodnight and joy be with you all.
Of all the comrades that ere I had, they're sorry for my going away,
And of all the sweethearts that ere I had , they wish me one more day to stay,
But since it falls unto my lot that I should rise while you should not,
I will gently rise and I'll softly call, "Goodnight and joy be with you all!"
Oh, if I had money enough to spend and leisure time to sit awhile
There is a fair maid in this town that sorely has my heart beguiled
Her rosey cheeks and ruby lips, she alone has my heart in thrall.
So fill me to the parting glass. Goodnight and joy be with you all.
~Awesome Irish folk song taught to me by Maggie
September 13, 2009
Time: 3:48 AM
Location: Still in the back of the hippie van
Mood: Lonely
Music: The Beatles (Obviously)
You say it's your birthday
Well it's my birthday too yeah
They say it's your birthday
We're gonna have a good time
I'm glad it's your birthday
Happy birthday to you
Yes we're going to a party party
Yes we're going to a party party
Yes we're going to a party party
I would like you to dance (birthday)
Take a cha-cha-cha-chance (birthday)
I would like you to dance (birthday)
Dance
I'm twenty-three today. Twenty-three. I feel older and younger at the same time, if that's even possible.
In celebration, I fucked some random dude in a grimy club bathroom.
Yeah, that made me feel real nice.
It seems like everything I do only serves to fragment my soul further. I'm perpetually reaching new lows of self-hate.
Happy birthday to me.
October 3, 2009
Time: 9:55 AM
Location: DALLAS, TX (who the fuck ever thought I would end up spending anytime in fucking DALLAS, TX. It's like the fucking anti-Boulder, and I'm ready for the next lo-cal)
Mood: Shocked.
The world is a ridiculously small place.
That fucking statement always seemed so moronic, but now I get it. The world is a fucking small ass place, and I'm a believer.
Either that or the universe hates me. And I have long suspected the later.
It all started when I somehow let James talk me into going to some cowboy bar with him last night. I was not particularly in the mood. Usually at these hick type bars half the male population sees me as this exotic little alien they simply must fuck while the other half thinks I'm some sort of scary hippy lesbian there to corrupt their conservative ideals and steal their women.
But I go. Because Jamie won't stop badgering me about it. Because I hate being a third wheel with Maggie and Liam when James goes out. Because when I'm alone I think about him too much, and I can't handle that much pain.
So I go to the goddamn bar.
Even though Dallas is a big city and James is the master at scoring drugs, we don't manage to get anything but some unbearably shit dank. Needless to say, I'm not fucking pleased with the way the evening's going. Plus after two beers, James leaves me all alone at the bar in favor for some big-boobed blonde stuffed into a pair of daisy dukes.
She is much better company than me being as she both smiles and laughs at his jokes. And will probably put out tonight. I rarely put out.
Laughter is so foreign an action, I think it would make my lungs pop if I attempted it. Don't even get me started on the smiling. Just imagining it is causing my face muscles to hurt.
I accept a couple drinks from strangers, but then completely ignore them so they quickly lose interest.
None of these men are the right man. There is only one right man, and I burned that bridge months ago. I wonder if he still thinks about me. I wonder if he misses me. I wonder if he is still deluded enough to think that he loves me. I wonder if my plan worked. I wonder if he sees now that he is better off without me. I want to want him to move on and forget about me.
But I don't. Deep down, in all my secret places - places only he has managed to see - I don't want him to forget me.
Because I haven't, nor will I ever, be over him.
All this runs through my head, causing me to brood at the cowboy bar. When no distraction serves to help me forget in the moment that I'm miserable, I play a game with myself. I pretend he's sitting next to me, and imagine what he would say.
Probably that I'm too beautiful for my own good as he glares at the leering cowboys around me. He would run his hands over my thighs while I attempt to appear unaffected, more interested in my drink than him but we both know I'm full of it. After questioning the sanitation of the nuts sitting in the bar, he would progress to try to convince me to ride the bull.
I glance at the mechanical beast in the center of the bar, and can easily see myself flying off the thing. Smiling to myself, I can almost hear his panic at my fall followed by his laughter when he realizes I'm okay.
"Holy shit." A deep, drawling voice interrupts my admittedly tame fantasies. The owner of said voice slides into the bar stood next to me. It takes me a full twenty seconds to comprehend who I'm seeing. "Bella Swan?"
"Holy shit," I somehow manage to respond despite my shock. "Peter Whatshisface?"
I still can't recall his last name.
He chuckles, waves over the bartender, and slides into the stool next to me as I continue to gape at him.
"Of all the bars in all of Texas…" I mumble into my cocktail, downing my whisky concoction and shaking my head.
"I know, right?" he agrees jovially, flagging down the bartender and ordering another round. "What the fuck are you doing here?"
"Just passin' through," I reply, still gaping at this familiar face. It has been so long. Recently, I have felt so disconnected from my life in Boulder. And Peter, somehow, brings me closer to the ones I left.
"Where's your geek?" he asks, looking around and making my heartache. Oh, how I long to be with my geek.
I don't say anything.
"Seriously?" he continues, poking me in the side with his elbow and cranking his neck to look around the bar. "Where is he? I mean, he's a buzz kill, but I've kinda been a bit rude to him in years past."
"A bit rude?" I sputter, suddenly infuriated with the man I barely know, breathing up my oxygen. "Try a total and complete raving dick for absolutely no reason."
"Whoa, how do you really feel, Isabella?" he asks with a chuckle, making me even madder. I hate it when people don't take me seriously.
"Bite me, motherfucker," I snap, finishing my drink.
"Believe me, baby," he drawls, leading too close and giving me what he must assume is a sexy smirk. It's not. "I would love too." And then, as if he couldn't get any creepier, he fucking leans back in the seat, stares at my ass, nodding his head, and grinning in appreciation.
I kick at his bar stop, causing him to slush beer all over himself.
"What the fuck!" he demands, glaring at me.
"Don't gawk, Petie. It's unattractive," I reply pleasantly.
"That's cold," he says, chuckling and smirking again as he dabs at his chest with a stack of napkins. "But you've always been one tough bitch. I like that about you."
"Gee," I reply, fluttering my eyelashes and flipping my hair. "You flatter me. I feel like the pertitest gal in the bar. What a complement."
"Believe it or not," he says after ordering me another drink, "I meant that as a complement. I admire strength."
Well, I certainly have this one fooled. What does one even say to that?
"But seriously, where is that man of yours?" he continues, obliviously to my discomfort. "I feel as though I should take this opportunity to make amends for how I treated him in the past."
"Oh really?" I ask, completely thrown by this statement.
"Yeah."
"Why did you do that anyway? I never got why you were such an ass to him. Alice and Em too. What, do you just hate Cullens?" I demand.
"Well, I was real fucked up for a long time," he admits, shaking his head. I can relate to this and suddenly he has my attention. "And Jazz was it, you know? My only friend. The only person ever willing to put up with me. Who the fuck knows why, but Jazz is Jazz. And then he went away for college, abandoning me."
"Ah yes," I say, nodding into my whiskey. "Abandonment."
"Right. Anyway, Jazz was thriving without me, talking about his fucking roommate new best friend. So obviously I hated him. From the get go he was just so painfully head over heels for Alice, it was like she was stealing him from me. And then I met Alice, who is nothing like anyone I would have picked out for my brother. I mean, she can't even cook!"
At this I actually chuckle. Because she fucking can't.
It feels so strange to be talking about Alice Cullen. Though I have thought about her often, her name feels weird on my tongue.
"It's like he had this whole other family and I only had him, so I hated them. I was a dick and my relationship with Jazz suffered for it. But I got my shit together," Peter concludes.
I'm in complete awe of his ability to just spill his guts to someone who is basically a stranger. I am very, very bad at spilling my guts. He is just fucking sitting there, admitting his mistakes and calming to be better.
It's terrible to be identifying with Peter Whathisface. Who I obviously hate.
"So you're what, like nice and shit now?" I ask, still skeptical.
"Not really. Sorta. I dunno." Stupid drunken idiot.
I spend the next hour grilling him on this getting better business. What does it mean? How did he do it? What exactly is involved in "getting better" and what does the end result look like? What do I first?
Peter is obviously annoyed by my barrage of questions, none of which he can answer satisfactorily.
"Bella! Shit, girl. Calm the fuck down. I don't know what to fucking tell you," he says, laughing at my pathetic desperation.
"But this getting better thing. I must know. How do you do it?" I ask with one last plea.
"You get happy, Bella," he says finally. "That's it. You just figure out how to be happy."
It's bizarre that Peter's words resonate with me so intensely.
"Wanna fuck in the bathroom?" he asks after a moment of blissful silence during which I am in a deep state of contemplation.
"And now you've ruined it," I reply, finishing my drink and stuffing a few bills in the tip jar. Rising and slipping my arms into my leather jacket, I kiss Peter's cheek. "Thanks for the words of wisdom."
"Good luck with the happy, bitchy Bella," he calls as I walk away.
October 14, 2011
I'll fly away, oh Glory
I'll fly away in the morning
When I die Hallelujah, by and by
I'll fly away.
When the shadows of this life have gone
I'll fly away
Like a bird from these prison walls I'll fly
I'll fly away.
I'll fly away, oh Glory
I'll fly away in the morning
When I die Hallelujah, by and by
I'll fly away.
Oh, how glad and happy when we meet
I'll fly away
No more cold iron shackles on my feet
I'll fly away.
I'll fly away, oh Glory
I'll fly away in the morning
When I die Hallelujah, by and by
I'll fly away.
When I die Hallelujah, by and by
I'll fly away...
~Alison Krauss & Union Station Lyrics Tape player broke in the van today. Turned out to be a rather good thing because Maggie and I sang bluegrass songs at the top of our lungs with the windows down. It was one of the rare moments on this little journey I haven't felt completely miserable.
October 23, 2009
Time: 6:37 AM
Location: A beach on the Gulf in Texas
Mood: Fine
I like Maggie. She's quirky. Soulful. Funny. Maggie looks at the world differently than anyone I've ever met and, like him, she sees right the fuck through my protective shield of toughness. Where he was gentle about getting me to open up, Maggie is blunt.
She's been fucking bullying me about telling her the whole story since we met in March and yesterday she kept buying me margaritas until I gave in. Cocksucker.
She told me to start at the beginning, so I did. I told her about my unorthodox childhood and the subsequent trust issues. I told her about Renee leaving and the subsequent abandonment issues. I told her about meeting him and fighting my connection to him and giving into him.
I devoted a good hour to talking about him before I got to the worst of it.
Maggie actually cried at that part, and then wouldn't stop hugging me for like seventeen fucking years.
"'Ave you ever considered gettin' all this analyzed by a professional?" she asked when she finally got a hold of herself. "Might make you feel better."
As ridiculous as it sounds, the thought of going to a shrink never crossed my mind. I always thought this destitute feeling was me. I thought the desire to be anyone else was permanent.
But maybe I was wrong. Maybe I could be fixed.
If I could be fixed, if I could get better, well. The possibilities for the direction of my life are endless.
And mostly they lead back to Boulder.
November 22, 2009
Time: 2:28 AM
Location: Does it even matter at this point?
Drugs, drugs, drugs, drugs, drugs.
That what life is like on the road with James, Maggie, and Liam.
I'm destroying myself. Just like I destroyed him. Just like I destroyed our baby. Just like I am actively destroying James. Maybe. Good God, I thought he was safe from my poison. James of all people.
Tonight, he declared his love for me.
We've been staying in this tiny town on the gulf coast. James has a friend here, and he's letting us stay in his basement. I sleep with James on a pull out couch, while Maggie and Liam stay in the van, parked at the side of the house.
And by sleep with, I mean sleep near. He doesn't hold me, and I can't stand the thought of touching him as I doze. We don't really even have sex very often, unless I am feeling particularly low.
Seriously, we're done it like ten times. Tops.
Mostly, he is just almost my friend. I wouldn't even really call him a friend. He's just… James.
We all go out. Maggie and Liam, James, his friend whose name I can't remember even though I am living in his basement. We go to a bar (as usual) and I don't really talk to anyone (as usual) or feel included at all (also, as usual).
Someone near me mentions brain synopsizes or some shit, and that's it. I'm miserable, and he is literally all I can think about. So I already have him on the brain from the get go, and it causes me to drink heavily (as usual. Again) and take some mystery pills.
Tonight was karaoke night at the local bar, and I was flying high. Maggie somehow convinced me to sing some terrible country song by fucking Kid Rock and Sheryl Crow. It's truly painful, and Maggie forced me into the guy part, but I was too high to really mind.
But then I realize that the song is about leaving, a break up. And the misery that follows. Everything comes rushing back, and I was really feelin' the song.
I can sing. Pretty well. And it occurred to me that he never heard me sing. So I pretended like I was singing to him and stared crying like a baby. But I must have done something right, because the crowd loved us and Maggie was hanging all over me, claiming that was the most beautiful thing she'd ever heard.
Which is impossible. Because the song was utterly shit.
But the cheesy ass song made everything come back, and all the excessive partying I've been doing as of late was for nothing because it didn't work. I can't forget. I feel so distant from everything I care about. Including myself.
Anyway, back to James.
God, he would hate my relationship with James. Though, despite James's general creepier status, he's been good to me. He gives me drugs. He keeps even creepier creepers away from me when I'm too high to know better or care. He makes me laugh. He is a total and complete asshole, and constantly tormenting me with really not fucking funny practical jokes, but overall he is a decent travel companion.
But I don't feel anything for him.
And tonight, my fucking country singing somehow lead to the realization that good old James is in love with me.
Damn it.
"I mother fucking love you, Bella Swan," he said after shoving me against the brick wall of the bar and attempting to kiss me breathless.
At least I had the good sense to slap him across the face the moment the words left his stupid mouth. Moments later I deteriorated into hysterical laughter.
"What?" he demanded.
"Everyone can say it so easily but me," I said through my laughter, not really talking to James at all.
"So you want to tell me you love me too but you can't?" he asked hopefully, eliciting another chuckle from me.
"Hell no," I said. "James, come on. We don't talk, unless drugs are involved. We don't fuck unless drugs are involved either, and even then its not all that often. You don't know me and you certainly don't love me."
"Oh yeah?" he asked with a smirk.
"Yeah. Plus I feel that way about someone else." My eyes went wide when I realized I inadvertently almost said the words I haven't even allowed myself to think in the last four years.
I was so shocked by myself, I progressed to vomit all over James's shoes.
It was a moment of utter and total revelation, but I can't think about that. I can't think about him.
I think I need a change. I'm tired of being a nomad. The wayfaring stranger lifestyle is not making me happy and it's no longer an adequate distraction.
December 4, 2009
A leopard cannot change its spots.
So shall you make your bed, so shall you must lie in it.
Better to loved and lost than to never have loved at all.
~Stupid ass proverbs that only serve to make me feel worse
January 1, 2010
Time: 3:47 AM
Location: Airport. Another blessed airport
Mood: Hopeful
Tonight was a very strange night. I haven't seen him in a whole goddamn, motherfucking, cocksucking year. A year in which I totally spiraled out of control, reaching new lows. Even for me.
Miserable. I can't remember the last time I've felt anything other than miserable. Desolate. Lonely. Broken.
I think about Peter's words and Maggie's, and wonder for the first time if it's possible. Maybe not to be happy and whole, but at least okay and content.
But it certainly wasn't going to happen in the life I've been living for the last year.
Tonight, shockingly, I was not in the mood to party. Sure, I indulged in a few drinks, but refused the hard stuff. I was just so blue. Introspective.
James tried to kiss me at midnight, and I completely lost my shit.
He kissed me last year. It was our last kiss, and letting James kiss me at midnight seemed like a further travesty to his memory. He must remain my last New Years kiss. It had to stay that way.
So I freaked. Minorly. Okay, majorly.
Storming off in a tizzy, I shoved all my shit into my backpack and my duffle and my purse, while James screamed at me to explain myself.
"I have to leave," I told him. "I'm dying out here, living like this."
"In case you forgot," he said with a sneer, "you have nowhere else to go. You burned every fucking bridge. Hurt everyone who cared about you. You don't got nowhere to go, you selfish bitch. I'm the best you can do. "
That made me real mad. In fact, I may have punched him. In the jaw instead of the customary shoulder. After getting over his initial shock that I actually slugged him (FUCK YES ISABELLA MARIE!) he just stood there with his arms crossed over his chest, smirking at me.
"You're not even good enough for me," he muttered. "You ungrateful cunt. I always knew you were a whore."
I thought about punching him again, but I figured a more productive use of my time would be packing up to get away from him as quickly as possible.
And then Maggie got involved.
That was even harder to handle than James.
First she got sad and pathetic. Then she got absolutely furious. And the finally stage was a combination of the two with a whopping pile of guilt. She said terrible things too, yelling at me that I belong there with her and, even more disturbingly, James. She said that we're meant to be together.
But I don't want that. Not at all.
I once told Maggie that I don't care about other people. I guess she didn't realize I was including her in this statement.
"But we're a family, Isa!" she howled as I waited impatiently on my cab. "Why can't you just settle? You're meant to be here with us! Why can't you see James is the man you're destined to be with? Stay."
"You're not my family," I whispered, eyes glued on the stars. I don't do family. Didn't I explain all of this to Maggie during our heart to heart?
Renee left. Twice.
Charlie died.
My baby disappeared.
So I don't do family. And if I did, I would never select these people.
All these bad things happened to me, but I've been realizing recently that a substantial chunk of my misery is self-inflicted. Shity things led to my lack of family, but it is also something I chose.
I chose to leave Boulder. I decided to leave Jake and Phil and Alice and Rose and Jasper and Emmett and Angela and Billy. I decided to leave all those people that care about me. For a long time, they were my family ever if I didn't recognize it. And I chose to throw that away.
And mostly him.
I left… Edward.
Edward.
If I had any family in this world after all my blood relatives vanished, he would be it.
My Edward.
How can it be that a year has gone by and I'm still not over him?
But these are the issues I am now choosing to face. I'm going to get better. I have to get better. And when I do, hopefully I'll finally be able to let him go for real.
Thoughts? I should have a Bella/Edward reunion chapter up later in the week. Thanks for reading!