20. Confessions

A/N: Thanks for all of the reviews. Special shout-out to Starnani21for their wonderfully thoughtful reviews.

Bella's POV

The entire ride home, a maelstrom of emotions raged within me, pelting forcefully at my insides. I sat silently in the front passenger seat, excruciatingly aware that the source of my internal tempest sat mere inches away.

As we pulled into the garage, I readied my hand to open my door the moment the Volvo stopped. I escaped up the stairs to my room as quickly as possible, imagining the hell I was putting Jasper through. It was all I could do to spare him. I was incapable of altering the emotions I felt, or mustering the desire to rein them in.

After all, Ihad just realized I was in love with my murderer.

I was in love with Edward.

In love with him.

How had I missed that happening? When had it happened? And why, of all times, had I decided to figure it out while trying to not suck every human within a hundred yard radius dry?

I collapsed onto my bed, the weight of my realizations and questions pushing me downward. I pulled in a deep breath, attempting to calm myself. Maybe I was being melodramatic.

Ok, I was definitely being melodramatic. But was I overreacting?

That was the more relevant question.

I quieted my frantic thoughts, struggling to relax and allow myself to feel and think slowly. Ever so gradually, I felt the tension leaking from my limbs as I sank deeper into the bed beneath me, arms by my side and feet still planted on the ground. It occurred to me that I wouldn't have been able to accomplish the feat just a few weeks before and I was appreciative of my progress. I let my eyelids flutter close, and blocked out as much of the hushed conversations emanating from downstairs as was possible. At the moment I didn't care to hear how the rest of the family may be interpreting my actions. Eventually my mind began to clear, and focus returned.

My first objective was extraneous. There hadn't been a true doubt in my mind from the moment I had looked up, leaning against that tree in the park. I had know exactly what I felt in that instant but I decided I should be thorough.

Was I sure I loved Edward? My revelation had come while we had been in an extremely intimate position. I smiled lightly at the fresh memory, my hand tingling with the ghost of his touch. Hmmm..perhaps my body was still betraying me with involuntary feelings. Perhaps I was imagining love where I only felt carnal desire.

I considered the possibility, but I swore the dead heart in my chest fluttered in protest and my mind began to spin, again flashing memory after memory of the moments I had shared with Edward. The whirlwind began with the scene from just under an hour before and stretched back for nearly six months.

The images were striking.

I pictured Edward's intense eyes, brimming over with fire, both in the park and as he had squeezed my hand in encouragement in front of his family. I recalled months of nights spent comfortably by his side, doing almost nothing. I thought of his mood swings, particularly on the day he had played the piano for me. I visualized the care and thought it had taken to retrieve pieces of my human past in the form of the pictures that hung on the wall of the room he had helped design. I remembered Edward's comforting embrace when I had first truly understood and mourned what I had become on that awful hunting trip. I thought of another hunting trip, another first, as he had shown me how to function in my new life, his hands gently but firmly gripping my shoulders in guidance. I replayed his voice in my ear as fire had burned every inch of me, purging mortality from my flesh. I contemplated the sound of soft velvet and ice cold touch in my final human memory.

Finally, the flurry was united as it returned to the present, to the most recent memory. I pondered the feel of Edward's hand leaving me own, and the ripping sensation of loss that still haunted me.

A common thread united each of these snippets; despite their wide range on the scale of pleasantness, Edward was always present. Every event that seemed most important to me, since the day I had so fatefully met Edward Cullen, included him. Looking in hindsight, I realized that though my very nature had certainly been altered, Edward was the most prominent and important change that had occurred.

Most of all, I couldn't come to regret that fact. I couldn't feel the horror I should have felt, given that he was the one who had taken my life. I knew I should have seen how unhealthy, how insane the connection was.

I couldn't do those things because I knew that the Edward I was attached to wasn't the same person that had coerced me into Forks High's student parking lot.

I knew this because Edward had been correct about at least one thing.

It had been a monster than had pierced my flesh and nearly drained my body of blood.

Only a monster could have performed the act. I knew that monster all too well, experienced its power and seen it face to face. Its face was one that changed, that morphed- that had been my own.

And that was how I knew that Edward and the monster were not one. That was why I had been able to forgive him all those months before. It was the reason I had so easily befriended him. Why I had now fallen completely in love with him.

The monster was bloodthirsty, demonic, red-eyed, evil, and soulless- all the things that Edward was not. Instead, Edward was everything I could ever wish to deserve, and I saw it in his numerous minute actions every day. He was kindness, gentleness, selflessness, joy and a thousand other redeeming qualities that had made him good- and set my own soul on fire.

I sighed, recognizing that there was no question left in my mind or heart.

I was entirely and irrevocably in love with Edward Cullen.

I bit my lip, savoring the feeling until reality struck. This was only the first point of many I had to consider. Slowly and grudgingly I moved my train of thought forward, only to have it come grinding to a halt, blocked by a new, fundamental question.

What was I going to do about this new found conviction?

I never got a chance to answer my question and plan a course of action. Instead, a series of other questions catapulted around my mind, seemingly spontaneously growing from the one before.

Did Edward feel the same way? Could he? What if he didn't? Why would he? Was I insane?

I felt my breath quicken out of habit as the answerless queries picked up the pace in their mental game of ping-pong. As several hours passed, my chest tightened, and panic unlike any I had ever known before, even when faced with the scent of human blood, flooded my body.

That's when I heard the slightest of knocks on the door, more than loud enough for me to hear.

Composing myself, I sat up and sucked in a breath to stop my purely emotional hyperventilating.

"Come in." I called, attempting to look like I hadn't just been in the middle of a nervous breakdown. I had severe doubts that my endeavors were effective.

The door creaked open, and in walked the source of both my elation and insecurities, in all of his glory.

If Edward had caught me off guard before with his good looks when I had been oblivious and distracted, the effect was now only amplified. I had no idea whether it was my own self-realization or the look of joyful determination lighting up his already attractive features that triggered this effect. Either way, it couldn't be denied. If my heart were capable of beating, it would have begun pounding out of my chest the moment he stepped through the door.

Stop it. Get yourself together! I internally chastised myself. Edward's presence in my room was a near nightly occurrence. There was no need to freak out. This was normal. Except nothing about this was normal- being in this room, in the presence of the man I had just realized I loved so fiercely- it was extraordinary.

"May I?" he asked quietly, gesturing to the bed.

I smiled.

"Of course," I responded, patting the fluffy white comforter under my hand, simultaneously scooting back and crossing my legs Indian-style so that I could sit facing him. He mirrored my posture, settling in with his hands in his lap.

I bit the right side of my bottom lip, pulling it in between my teeth as I contemplated how close we were, knees nearly touching.

He looked at my face searchingly, his eyes quizzical. Like I had often seen him do before, I knew he was trying to read my thoughts, to no avail. I could think of no other time I had been so grateful his power was disabled around me- I didn't want to imagine the embarrassment.

The corners of his mouth turned up into the slightest of crooked grins and he shook his head, failing to breach my mind's walls.

His eyes shot downward for an instant, then came back up to reach mine.

"It was quite an evening wasn't it?" he finally asked.

"You could say that." I answered, a teasing tone disguising how incredibly monumental the last few hours had been for me, in ways he couldn't possibly know.

"I'm proud of you, just so you know."

I quickly filled with warmth at his words, gratified by his praise. The sensation was short-lived, my mind flashing back to the blonde runner.

"Really?" I asked, omitting my first thought. "Because I almost attacked that girl."

He shook his head, brows knitting together and creasing his marble forehead. "No you didn't, and we both know it. Even if I hadn't pulled you out of the way, you wouldn't have bitten her."

"How do you know that? I was practically in attack position."

"Yes, you're body reacted in a natural fashion. But if you were going to kill her, you wouldn't have asked for my help and she would have been dead before I had a chance to stop you."

I contemplated this, considering how distracted we had both been prior to her approach. I supposed he wouldn't have been able to stop me in time had I made the decision.

I nodded my head slightly, accepting his reasoning and caught up again in the moments that had immediately followed his pulling me off the path.

"Well, then thank you," I offered shyly, keeping my other thoughts to myself.

A smile returned to his face and his eyes clouded over with thought in response. Suddenly, he was leaning forward, elbows on his knees and hands clasped together in front of him. His face settled mere inches from my own, and his hands brushed lightly at my jeans.

"Bella, would you come out for a run with me?" he asked unexpectedly, his breath gently brushing against my face and filling my senses with sweetness highlighted by warm overtones.

I wanted to tell him I would go anywhere with him. I considered saying I would do anything to spend every possible moment with him.

"Sure," I answered instead, sticking to guarded simplicity.

Yet again, a perfectly lopsided grin curled its way onto his face. I couldn't help but smile myself as he rose from the bed, offering his hand.

The feeling was so natural, so welcome; I didn't even think to consider the abnormality as my fingers laced with his. It seemed like it was the only way for us to be, bonded together like this. It was impossible to think that before today such physical connections had been nonexistent since that day by the piano.

My body was soothed by his touch, all notes and hints of previous panic erased as he pulled me down the stairs and out the back door, into the night.

As we ran, my mind wandered to other runs through similar settings. I thought of the pure freedom and exhilaration of my first run after awakening and contemplated the comfort of Edward's hand after my devastating realization of my new nature. To me, it seemed this setting was a perfect hybrid of the two- neither tinged by loneliness nor regret.

However, all three runs did hold one emotion in common- confusion.

I could no less deny I was perplexed about what my next move should be than I could have in either of the two previous instances. If anything, I was plagued by more confusion.

However, I decided that for the moment I didn't want to care. Instead, I reveled in the feel of Edward's skin against my own and the rush of wind and fauna surrounding me. Pure contentment washed over me, and only Edward's slowing pace brought me out of my carefree state.

I matched my stride to his, bringing myself to a full stop. I looked around, finding that we were in a quiet, remote clearing.

Again, I was struck with déjà vu. Certainly, it had vast dissimilarities with the meadow in Forks. The space was much smaller than the other, and had ragged edges that left it with a shape nowhere near a perfect circle. The grass here was short and had a rougher texture. Yet I couldn't deny the memories it brought up, nor the beauty supplied by the dotting of summer flowers in bloom.

Like on that day in Forks, the clouds uncharacteristically parted, though it was moonlight rather than sun that peaked through. The pale beams illuminated the clearing, reflecting off the whiteness of our skin, instead of sparkling diamonds.

Our hands had never parted, and he pulled me closer so that I was looking directly up into his pale golden eyes. The bright moon allowed a reflection of my own, and this time I saw my own yellow-orange ones glinting back in his dark pupils.

"Do you remember why I brought you to a similar place on that first day in Forks?" Edward's question reverberated through the near-silent forest, and transported me back to his tortured face. The image was in conflict with the reality in front of me- solemn yet filled with traces of excitement and expectancy.

"How could I forget?" I answered, infected by his serious tone. For the briefest of moments I saw a flash of regret flicker through Edward's eyes, before it was forced back by purposeful determination.

He nodded. "That day, I took you out there intending to explain to you who I was."

I looked questioningly into his eyes, wondering what his point could possibly be. Why was he bringing this up now?

"Tonight, I'm doing the same because I feel like the same description no longer applies."

I raised an eyebrow, coaxing him with my expression to continue. There was a long pause as I waited, before Edward's eyes went ablaze, as if a match had been thrown into a room full of gasoline fumes. The sight was shocking, yet enticing.

"Bella, I've never been able to resist you. At first, I assumed it was only your blood that drew me. Initially, it was. So I told you I was a killer, a monster."

I flinched at his words, but waited in silence for him to continue, still in the dark concerning his point.

"But, you've proven me wrong. Not only could I not refuse your blood, I couldn't refuse your spirit, your smile, your compassion…" he trailed off, eyes breaking with mine as he looked off into the dark for a moment, hand tightening around my fingers.

My mind raced at his words, and I felt a deep, raw hope bubbling up. I squeezed his hand back, matching his grip.

"And I've tried over these past few months, tried so hard to keep my distance. I just can't anymore Bella. You've brought me back to life. As crazy as it sounds, you've awoken my soul. Otherwise, there is no explanation for the way I feel. I no longer call myself monster and vampire alone. You've turned me into a man Bella- one who loves you, deeply and unconditionally."

I made the smallest of gasps, shocked at the end of his soliloquy. I stood in awe, amazed that the beautiful creature- man- before me had just said the very words I had so ardently wished for just minutes before. I couldn't speak, much less breathe. Lost in my elation, I didn't realize how long I blankly stood there until Edward tenderly, nearly imperceptibly, squeezed my hand.

"Bella?" he questioned lightly. I didn't respond, only beginning to bring myself back to my surroundings. "Bella? I don't expect you to reciprocate. I just couldn't hold my silence or distance any longer. Of course, if you wish, I can give you space. I could even leave. Speak the word and-"

My eyes snapped to his, possessed with fervor as I cut him off.

"I love you too," I offered in response, forcefully.

If I thought his eyes had been ablaze before, now they positively smoldered. Not another word was spoken as his free hand levitated through the air, resting on my cheek.

I closed my eyes, leaning into his palm. His thumb gently grazed over my skin, drawing its short path several times in succession before his fingers hooked under my chin, drawing it upward. Our eyes made contact, before our foreheads then noses followed suit. I sighed gently, relief flooding my body as months of unknown tension escaped and our lips came within inches of each other.

Finally, the last bit of distance closed, and we were no longer separate beings suppressing their greatest desires. Our mouths moved in tandem, his lips impossibly soft and firm at the same time. I hooked an arm around his neck, my fingers weaving into his hair as our reverent kisses served as flawless confessions of our love.

A/N: And with that excruciating but rewarding writing experience, our beloved protagonists have finally pulled their heads out of you-know-where.

I'm frantically working on this story- I'm so excited to see it moving toward a resolution- but do not be distressed- the plot has yet to thicken once (or twice) more ;0. Of course, I'm sad to see it all ending. However, updates *should* speed up. You're reviews are exactly the fuel I need to accomplish this- they make me more happy than you could know, so…click the button!