SM owns.

Mari, I'm running out of words for your awesomeness.

Enjoy.

Chapter 15: Summer Kissed Skin.

"And that is how change happens. One gesture. One person. One moment at a time."

Libba Bray, The Sweet Far Thing.~

I run. I run, pushing my muscles to their limit. I feel the burn and the ache as I force myself to keep running. I fool myself into thinking that the more I run, the less I think. If only that were true.

With each fast step my legs take, I'm assaulted by a new memory of her. I'm out of breath and every part of my body aches, but it has nothing to do with the exercise. I see her face every time I close my eyes.

I miss her with every breath I take and every beat of my heart.

Where are you?! Why aren't you back? I want to scream.

So I just keep running.

"Damn, Eddy, did you run a marathon?" Emmett asks before letting me in to his apartment. I can't catch my breath. I'm drench in sweat and thirsty. I'm sure I look like the mess I've been for the past months.

I ignore my brother and make my way to his kitchen. I drink a full water bottle before joining him in his living room.

"You are not sitting your sweaty ass on my couch, bro." He tells me when he sees my intention to just crash face first on it. He drags a bar stool from his kitchen and ushers me to it. I snort and sit on the uncomfortable chair. My muscles scream in protest.

It's a different kind of pain. I welcome it.

I talk about nothing important with Emmett for a while until his cell phone rings. If it were possible, I'm sure I'd be able to see the skip of his heart to match the spark in his eyes. It's Rosalie.

My heart twists and contorts at the sight. I'm happy for him, but more than that I'm just plain jealous. I don't even care if it's selfish at all. I'm a monster when it comes to her.

"Um, yeah…he's here." I hear my brother's voice. He looks at me while I fiddle with the string of my sweatpants. "Are you kidding me? I can't….No way." He's speaking in hushed tones. I can't make out everything he says but he's starting to act really strange.

He looks at me a lot before returning back to his conversation, lowering his voice when he catches me looking back at him.

"…going to kill him. Fuck no, Rose, I won't." He's starting to get angry. He looks tense. I stand up and walk to him.

"What's going on?" I ask. He mumbles some words and I'm tempted to take the cell phone from his hands.

"Rosalie's being silly, no worries." He says after a moment, a fake smile on his face.

"Emmett, what is going on?" I ask again, annoyed because I can tell he's hiding something from me.

The minute it clicks I run out of his apartment.

She's back.

"Rosalie, open the door!" I yell, knocking her door not caring about what anyone may think. As soon as I put two and two together, I went back to my apartment and retrieved my car. Rosalie lives close to Bella's so I couldn't exactly walk or run there.

I didn't change out of my work out clothes. I just picked my car keys and drove straight to Rosalie's place. I've been knocking, pounding on her door for at least twenty minutes. I'm pretty damn close to just breaking the thing down.

I'm sure Rosalie's hiding her from me, but why? She knows how I've been. She knows how in need of seeing her again I am. Why would she hide her from me? Unless Bella asked her to.

"Damn it Rose! I swear to God—" I start but I'm cut off by the door opening.

"What the hell is your problem?!" Rosalie asks me, dressed in pajamas, an angry look on her face. I heave breaths that are too shallow to fill my lungs, before stepping inside her apartment without her permission. She curses me as I search every room like I have a right to.

"You know…you know what my problem is! Where is she?" I sound crazy even to myself. I stop for a moment, trying to calm down. I'm shaking.

"Well, not here, obviously." She answers with her usual mask of indifference. She reminds me of Bella sometimes. Not because everything does, but because they are similar in a lot of ways.

"She's back. I know it. Why are you lying to me?" I ask on the verge of tears, grabbing fistful of my hair with both hands.

"Edward, have you looked at yourself? You are one goddamn mess. Go home, take a fucking shower, drink some tea, and sleep the day away. You have my blessing." She says and goes to her room. I think she's going to come back out but then I hear the shower running.

Fuck.

I stand up and look around some more, slower this time. Thinking that maybe she isn't here right now, but she may be staying here. So I start to look for things, belongings that may look like hers. I find nothing.

With a heavy sigh, heavy limbs and heavy heart, I leave. I walk down the stairs defeated and disgusted with myself. I'm stupid and maybe a little out of my mind. I owe Rosalie an apology.

I'll ask for one tomorrow.

The walk to my car, parked in front of Rosalie's building, feels like millions of miles away.

Several things happen all at once; a gasp, a change in the air, the noise of things falling to the floor as my heart falls into place.

She's here.

I can sense her before I see her. Everything around me feels different, unimportant, background noise.

She's here.

My eyes follow the contents at both of our feet until I'm staring at her beautiful face. Her brown eyes are wide with shock. Her hair is blowing all around her with the wind, carrying her intoxicating scent to me. She's wearing jeans and a sweater. I've never seen her dressed so…carefree.

We stand, suspended in time, grocery items lying on the floor as the world goes on around us. I take a real breath for what feels like forever. She's perfect. Even more than she's always been to me.

"Edward," she whispers, and I think I can exist again. I'm not a person in this planet unless it's for her. My name falling from her lips gives my heart meaning. My veins pump life into my body for a meaning, with a purpose, now that she's here in front of me. Now that she has spoken my name.

"You're back." I say with reverence, as if I'm standing in front of a Goddess. She is to me. She's everything and more to me. My lifeline, my religion, my passion and my love. My reason for existence.

She nods, her face neutral. For some reason, that small movement snaps me into action and I'm crouching on the floor picking up her stuff.

I'm transported to that day we met.

Except it's nothing like that. Everything's different now. And when she lowers to the ground and helps me, she proves everything is different.

Together, careful of not touching each other, we arrange her items back into the brown bag.

"Thank you." She says in a low, timid voice as we stand up. She doesn't even bother to dust off her jeans. I search her eyes. I stare, and stare, thinking that I can find a way into her soul…or at the very least, her complicated mind.

"Bella," I start but she shakes her head.

"I, um, Edward…we, can we talk?" She says, tripping over her words. I nod at her and motion for my car. She follows me, grocery bag in hands and steps inside.

For a minute, I just sit there, behind the wheel, not moving, not turning on the car. I face her. She startles.

"Look, if you're here to…whatever you have to say, just…do it. Okay? Just say it." I ramble, trying to look strong. Trying to let her know, that if she's here to break my heart again, she can just do it.

"I love you." She says in response and I think I've entered another world. I gape at her. She laughs a weird, nervous laugh and shakes her head. "I guess, I should've said I was sorry first. I am, sorry, that is. So sorry, you…you, I don't deserve you." She says and I'm in complete shock. I'm not sure I'm hearing her right.

For a minute I'm angry. Angry that I don't even get to really savor those words coming out of her lips. She's said I love you and I'm sorry and I'm just at lost for words.

This is definitely not how I pictured this day. I thought, she was going to show up at my place when she came back, and hug me and kiss me, and she would whisper those words against my lips. However, we're trapped in my car. I'm wearing dirty, old clothes, coming down from an almost panic attack.

She's looking at me, expecting me to do something, to say something. But I just can't. I'm still adjusting to her presence in front of me. I'm still trying to comprehend what's going on.

"I knew it!" She snaps all of a sudden, startling me. "You've moved on, haven't you?" She says with unshed tears in her eyes. "You don't want me anymore. This is why I didn't want to leave! You finally figured out you deserved better than me, and I get it, you do, but…but I thought…I mean, you said…you promised…you were going to wait, and I tried, I tried really hard, because I wanted to come back to you, and be with you, because I love you, I love you so much! I have loved you all along, I just didn't, I just couldn't…but I worked on it, I'm still working on it, but it's okay, you deserve to be happy. Does she make you happy Edward? I hope she does, I mean it, because…I…"

"Bella!" I shout at her, and she shuts up abruptly, tears falling down her face. This is familiar. This kind of rambling is coming from the woman I fell in love with. She may be dressed differently, her hair may be longer, her skin may be sun kissed and she may have gotten down to the floor to pick up groceries in the middle of the street, but she is still there.

"Finally, something I know." I whisper, because even though our relationship was hard and difficult and even though she had some issues to work on, I never wanted her to be a different person. I fell in love with all of her, flaws and all.

And before she went on in that long rant, I didn't understand why I hadn't said more than a few words to her. But I get it now. I was scared and apprehensive of her being someone else. I thought all these months apart would make a stranger out of her, but maybe not.

Because that endearing mini breakdown she just had, it's as familiar as the Seattle rain. I take her hand in mine, and close my eyes at the electro-shock of her touch. She sniffs-gasps at the contact, her brown eyes questioning as she looks at me.

I rub my thumb over her knuckles as I talk.

"Bella, sweetheart…there's…no one." I start, and I can see her body relax. Before I know what I'm doing, I'm taking her face in both of my hands. "Do you understand that? Trust me, there's no one else." I say, pouring honesty into my voice. She nods as I clean her face from her tears.

"Edward…I know…I know I have no right. I'm sorry." She says and I shake my head and in a bold move, peck her lips. She's still precious to me. No matter what.

The small kiss is not enough to extinguish my thirst for her, but it seems to reassure us both about what we want.

After a few minutes we calm back down and I drive us to my apartment. When we get there I can feel the tension in the air. This place is ours. Not mine. And I know it's affecting her, being here…as much as it's affecting me having her back here.

I try to underplay it, so I excuse myself to take my needed shower, leaving her in the living room. I try to clear my head as the water cleans my skin, but after I'm done, my thoughts are still a mess.

I get dressed in old jeans and a t-shirt and join her in the living room. When I get there, she's standing next to the phone, a frown on her face. She doesn't face me while I stand behind her at a safe distance, but I know she knows I'm in the room.

"Why is Rosalie calling you?" She asks. Doesn't she know? "Why…were you exiting Rosalie's building?" She asks turning to face me, confusion written all over her face.

"Um…she and Emmett are kind of a thing now." I started. It was the safest way. She looks surprised. "Bella, just how much you and Rosalie have talked in the past months?" I ask. She smiles a sad smile.

"Not much. And apparently not enough." She answers and moves to sit on the couch. I join her.

I tell her about running into Rosalie that night at the bar, and how she became a constant in my life. She listens without interrupting or commenting on my stories about not wanting to get out of bed some mornings and Rosalie being the one to kick my ass for it.

"She's a bit…insistent." I say and Bella smiles lightly before nodding.

"So you guys are friends." She states.

"Yeah, I mean…sure…why? Is that a problem?" I ask when I see the grim look on her face. Her face softens when she hears me and shakes her head.

"No, no! It's just…she never mentioned it, that's all. In fact…she wouldn't even let me talk to her about you." She tells me.

"Well, if it's any consolation…she…she never really let me talk to her about you either…" I offer and we fall into an uncomfortable silence. We both fidget a lot, not finding our place in the couch, not knowing what to do with our hands, not knowing where to look. It's awful. But I'll take this any day instead of her piercing absence.

"Do you want something to drink?" I ask after a while. She shakes her head.

"I went to this place…" She starts out of nowhere, sitting cross-legged on the couch, her back to the armrest, facing me. Her eyes are focused, like a woman on a mission. She looks determined, but there's this vulnerability underneath it. I can't explain it, but it's there. I mirror her position and brace myself for her story. "um…it was like a support group, people with all kinds of issues and problems went there to…talk to each other, I guess, and to the professionals that run the show…" She begins. "The people there, they were dealing with the kind of issues I have—had. People with so much bigger problems than mine…and I just sat there, listening to them talk about what they've gone through, what their loved ones had gone through; accidents, illnesses, abuse, addictions, and I was just there with my petty little trust issues and insecurities. It was an eye-opener." She says and I soak up her words.

She looks at me the whole way through her speech. She doesn't lower her eyes or hides behind her hair. She actually has it up in a pony tail. I want to comment on it but refrain.

"I have made so many mistakes." She continues. "But, I'm not ashamed of them, I'm just sorry because I've hurt so many people. Because I've been blind for so long." She says and I swear her eyes throw an arrow to my soul.

"Where were you?" I ask, my voice barely audible.

"California." She answers. That explains her summer like glow. I have this urge to taste her and see if I can find the sun on her skin. "It was a nice house. We had a schedule but we had a lot of freedom. I mean, it wasn't a rehab center, you know? I just basically spent a lot…a lot of time talking about me and my concerns and…"

"Me?" I fill for her when she falls silent. Her eyes soften. No, not just her eyes. Her entire face.

"Of course."

I can't contain my smile. She laughs out loud and it's the most amazing sound in the entire world. I join her. It feels like Heaven.

"I missed you so much." She says after we stop laughing. Her eyes nothing but sincere.

Without any type of apprehension, I drag her across the couch and we hug in the middle of it. I bury my face in her neck and feel her heart beat in harmony with mine. We both take deep breaths, holding each other tightly.

"Oh, Bella…I miss you too."

We arrange each other on the couch until her back is pressed to my front, my arms around her and her hands playing with my fingers. This new position, even though it's giving me the intimacy I crave and her healing touch, prevents me from looking at her eyes as she recounts several things from her months away. But she often cranes her neck to meet my eyes, so I guess it's okay.

She tells me about writing letters that were never sent to people she's hurt in the past. About having a better understanding on the subject of what having control over one's emotions and feelings really is. About learning that it's okay to need help and let people in…about realizing that she doesn't have to repeat her mother's mistakes. She tells me about talking to her dad and how they are slowly staring a relationship.

I stay silent as she talks, except for when I asked her why she didn't call me, and she told me how she was advised not to, so that all of her work on herself was based on her and not me. I didn't understand much of that having to do with calling me, but I let it go. She's here now.

She shares all these stories without me having to ask, and I can hear and feel the tremor in her voice at some parts. I can see the amount of effort it takes for her not to fold into herself and stop sharing. I can see her struggle with wanting to hide behind her mask of indifference. However, I see her pushing through all of that. I see the flicker of pride in her eyes at having conquered her obstacles. I see her desire to keep growing.

I love her more than ever. I love her fragility and vulnerability. I love the way she smiles at me when I kiss her head out of nowhere. I love the way she tightens her hold on my hands when her story gets rough. I love the way she's scared and unsure. I love the way I know as soon as we find our rhythm again she's going to be giving me hell as usual. I love the fact that this is a new Bella intertwined with the Bella I fell in love with. I get to discover new parts of her and I get to be there when she discovers new sides of herself.

"I met with James last month." Bella's voice brings me out of my thoughts. "We had lunch together…He forgave me for…uh, cheating on him. He has a new girlfriend. He's moving to Chicago, I think. We left on good terms…I think. I hope." She tells me and I stay quiet. All of a sudden she turns around, sitting on her folded legs like a little girl and looks at me before talking. "I did that for myself, because I needed to do it. But I did it for us too. I don't want James to be a ghost in our relationship. I want us to be Bella and Edward, Edward and Bella, and that's it." She says with the most serious look on her face. I'm so shocked I don't even know how to react, so I just stare at her. I'm sure my mouth is hanging open right now. I mean…I can't even…

"I mean, that is…if you still…if you want…to be with me, of course." She says and it's the first time she lowers her eyes from mine in the past few hours. I chuckle at her silliness.

"Bella," I whisper as I take her face in my hands, forcing her eyes back to mine, "you know I want to be with you. I thought…I thought that was clear."

"You haven't said it back." She says in a small voice. Irony lives in this moment. I take a deep breath, preparing myself. My life will change after this. I know it. I'm ready for it. I've been waiting and dying for it.

With a smile, and pouring my heart into my words, I say:

"I love you too, Bella."

And life is exactly how it's supposed to be.

Thank you for reading.

This is the final chapter. I should have an epilogue in a couple of weeks or so.