Disclaimer: I do not own any of the Twilight characters or the rights to "The Trapeze Swinger" performed by Iron and Wine, and I will not be earning income from using these materials. I do, however, own the storyline and any original characters. Thank you.

A/N: As stated before, here are the main character's ages during this chapter, just to clear up any questions from my readers. Otherwise, my lovelies, you know you are always welcome to ask anything or make any comments that your pretty hearts desire. :)
Bella: 14 years old
Edward: 17 years old
Emmett: 19 years old
I hope you enjoy.

Chapter Two:
The Trapeze Swinger

Please, remember me, at Halloween
Making fools of all the neighbors
Our faces painted white
By midnight
We'd forgotten one another
And when the morning came
I was ashamed
Only now it seems so silly
That season left the world
And then returned
And now you're lit up by the city

"The Trapeze Swinger," Iron & Wine

x0x0x0x0x0x

Three Years Later

The delicate harmony of notes that danced out from underneath her steadily moving fingertips flowed around the room. The graceful tones cascaded down on their audience, drawing a hidden smile from him in the midst of his concentration.

Hovering over his guitar and leaning against the suede beanbag in the corner of the Swan's living room, Edward picked a few tuning notes directly by his ear and closed his eyes, listening to the melody that his favorite student played out with passion.

In an unfortunate instant, two wrong chords created a dissonant cacophony of sound. He flinched ever so slightly as his highly impatient student slammed two fists down on the ivory keys and finally slouched over the keyboard, which crashed again as her forehead hit the piano.

"Izzy," he sighed, absently strumming a chord on his guitar as he continued to tune the instrument, "you have to be patient, babe. You're learning." He glanced up at his student and chuckled at the death glare she was emitting from underneath her arm. She lifted her head and rolled her eyes distinctly as she fingered a few chords on her instrument.

"How would you even know? It's not like it takes you long to learn anything," she scowled, gesturing to the guitar he was strumming while staring at her face. "See? You don't even have to try. 'Natural talent,' like Mom says."

"It's not always all about talent, Iz." Edward glanced back down at the guitar in his hands and pulled a few more chords from its strings. "It's about passion and persistence. And you've got both in spades." He smiled back up at his fourteen-year-old protégé who drank the compliment in and beamed back at her tutor. "Now, try again."

Her beaming smile dropped off instantly and a deep groan took its place.

"Come on, Edward, my lesson was over ten minutes ago!" Leaping off the piano bench, Izzy took three long strides across the living room, snatched her camera off the table, and lay down on her stomach at the foot of Edward's beanbag, her abdomen resting in between his feet and her elbows on the insides of his knees. "It's your turn to sing to me."

Edward glanced over at the hand that was tightening the peg on the head of his guitar and then back to the girl between his knees who stared up at him with her newly patented puppy dog eyes. He burst out laughing.

"Okay, okay … only if you stop making that face," he smirked as her lips turned down in a mock frown and she reached out to slap his knee. He gestured lightly in her direction. "What do you want to hear?"

Izzy's eyes suddenly dropped to the back of her camera. She fiddled shyly with the settings as a bashful grin spread across her face.

"Our song, please," she murmured, so softly that Edward reached down and lifted her face to his.

"Hey, Iz, it's our song for a reason. So we'll never forget each other, right?" The young girl nodded as he leaned back and positioned himself. "Don't you ever be ashamed of that." He picked one string before gently strumming the opening chords. A crooked smile stretched across his lips when he sang.

"Please, remember me, happily, by the rose bush laughing with bruises on my chin, the time when we counted every black car passing your house beneath the hill and up until someone caught us in the kitchen with maps, a mountain range, a piggy bank. A vision too removed to mention."

His voice was smooth with a perfectly grained overtone, drifting through the familiar melody easily. Izzy sighed as she positioned herself behind her camera, taking practiced, hidden shots as the warmth of his low tenor curled itself around her body while safety, home, and warm cocoa drifted through her veins.

"But please, remember me, fondly … I heard from someone you're still pretty, and then, they went on to say that the pearly gates had some eloquent graffiti like 'we'll meet again,' and 'screw the man,' and 'tell my mother not to worry.' And angels with their gray handshakes were always done in such a hurry. And –"

The high pitched tones of a strummed electric guitar interrupted the soft melody just as he reached the third verse, pulling both of them out of their entranced state as Edward reached for his phone and Izzy scowled at the offending object.

Flipping the small silver device open, Edward grinned. He pulled his guitar from his shoulders, setting it in the case lying next to him. He stood up and pulled Izzy with him in one smooth motion.

"I'm sorry, Iz, it's time for me to hit the road," he murmured as he knelt down to pack the remaining accoutrements.

He stood to find her seated on the couch across the living room, staring intently at the small camera in her hands, her lips pursed so tightly that all traces of color left their usual fullness as blank as her face. Edward slipped his hands into his pockets. A soft weight settled in his chest at the look in her eyes. Neither was truly sure why his leaving mattered so much.

Each simply knew that it did.

"Iz," he sighed, "it's just dinner. Marissa is my friend." She finally turned her large brown eyes to meet his.

"I know," she returned the sigh, picking the camera up from her lap and snapping another quick shot as Edward paced over and sat next to her. He slung an arm around her slim frame and rubbed her shoulder.

"I promised Marissa I would see her tonight, and you know how I feel about my promises." Izzy nodded, laying her head on his shoulder as she continued to study the back of the camera. Edward tried again.

"Nothing's going to change, Iz. I'm gonna be back tomorrow morning to pick you up for school, and no matter how many girls I go to dinner with, you will always be my Izzy, okay? Always."

Izzy finally lifted her eyes to meet his, her long lashes flickering softly against her cheeks and stealing his breath for the barest second he would allow, the soft weight in his chest squeezing tightly till his heart skipped a beat and his breathing became shallow. He almost missed her faint whisper in his distraction.

"Promise?"

"Of course, Iz," he smiled genuinely, pressing a soft kiss to the crown of her head and running a hand through her hair and across her cheek.

"For always. I promise."

Two Months Later

Soft strums of an acoustic melody coursed through the air from the small surround sound speakers scattered about the room. Edward rested against the headboard of his bed, slipping both hands behind his neck and shutting his eyes while his fingertips drummed out the beat. Izzy's birthday was in two weeks and he was almost finished with his gift, a semi-professional recording of their song and a special something extra – another song he had begun writing for her a few months ago.

There was only one small hitch in his plan – he was having serious writer's block. The notepad and pen had been tossed aside hours ago, replaced by the guitar that sat face up in his lap. One hand moved from behind his head and began to pick at the strings on his guitar again, his mind moving through the lyrics of the one song that seemed appropriate.

"But please, remember me, my misery, and how it lost me all I wanted. Those dogs that love the rain and chasing trains, the colored birds above there running in circles round the well, and where it spells on the wall behind –"

The high pitched tones of his cell phone interrupted his singsong murmurs. Rolling his head towards the clock, Edward squinted in the dim yellow light, blinking the liquid out of his burning eyes until he finally read the time – 2:24 am. Surprise forced his lethargic brain into action as he reached over and squinted again at the display. His surprise doubled at the name.

"Izzy?" He murmured, his voice grainy from disuse. An abrupt sob was her only response. Edward sat up at the sound and placed the guitar beside him on the bed, instantly walking to the closet, sliding on a gray hoodie and sneakers, and picking his keys up from the bedside table. Her short, stifled sniffles continued.

"Iz, it's okay baby. Whatever happened, it's okay." Just as he reached the door to the garage, he caught her soft whisper through the receiver.

"It's dad."

Shit.

"What happened," he prompted when he was met with quiet on the other end.

"He …" her murmurs barely echoed into the receiver and Edward pushed the phone closer to his ear, straining to hear. "Edward, he – he's gone," she sobbed, dissolving again as his foot subconsciously pressed harder on the gas pedal.

"Okay, Iz, put down the phone and get yourself some tissues. I'm already on my way."

"Please hurry," came the whisper as the phone clicked gently in his ear.

Five minutes later, Edward pulled into the Swan's driveway and parked in the yard behind two patrol cars. He steeled himself as he walked up to the doorway and was not surprised when Izzy ran through the door and across the five foot gap, throwing herself into his open embrace. The front of his hoodie was instantly wet with her tears.

"Shhh," he hummed, running his hands through her hair while her small fists wrapped themselves in the excess material of his jacket. Finally, after ten minutes of standing in the damp grass, Izzy's small body began to shake and Edward pulled her into his arms, carrying her bridal-style back to the house and scowling at her previously unnoticed lack of footwear.

Edward stepped quietly into the house, noticing only the two patrol officers sitting around the Swan's dining room table; Izzy's mother was nowhere to be seen. He nodded at the officers and started up the stairs. Izzy's arms wrapped around his neck as her eyes remained closed, her breath coming in small, sharp puffs.

Regardless of his attempts to be as quiet as possible, the stairs continued to creak under his feet, complaining at carrying both his weight and that of the broken girl in his arms. He had three stairs left to the top of the landing when Izzy's parents' bedroom door creaked open. Edward halted in his tracks, not prepared to deal with another distraught female. He could only release a relieved sigh when Mrs. McCarty slipped from the bedroom. She smiled softly at both of them.

"Thank you," she whispered, running her fingers through Izzy's hair. Edward could see her thin fingers tremble.

"Was your hus–" he started, but her quick nod cut him off.

"Robert was there." She sighed, her jittery limbs repeating their path and her gaze fixed on the spot. "I know Emmett will regret not being here." She paused, looked up. "But … at least she has you." Mrs. McCarty slipped the hand that had been running through Izzy's hair up to Edward's shoulder.

"Take her away from here, Edward. Please."

And then she was gone, sweeping down the steps and into the kitchen.

It was nothing short of a miracle that the McCartys lived next door to the Swans. Ellen and Renee had been fast friends, both bonding over the anxieties that came with living life as the spouse of someone constantly in the line of fire. They had managed to survive sixteen years with no tragedies. That streak of luck had obviously run out.

Edward was thankful that Renee had Ellen McCarty's nurturing presence to soothe her pain. He already had no idea what to do with the one charge he had, so he decided to make use of her advice. Slipping into Izzy's room, he picked up a pair of fuzzy socks and her bright, multicolor-flowered rain boots from her closet, sat on her bed, and pulled them both on her feet as she lay in his lap, breathing slowly.

He then wrapped her up in her queen comforter and, throwing the excess over his shoulder, he walked quietly back down the stairs and out the kitchen door. Mrs. McCarty had obviously gone back upstairs, as a teakettle sat heating on the stove, but otherwise the small, warm room was empty.

Edward adjusted Izzy in his arms as she rolled over and breathed out lightly. Stepping through the door, he hurried across the wet grass and disappeared into the woods. He couldn't see his feet, but fortunately, he didn't need to. His steps were practiced as he ducked in the appropriate places and wound through the trees. Ten minutes later, he had made the quarter mile trek, breaking through a line in the forest and into a small, peaceful valley where the Sol Duc River ran in a steady motion.

He walked a bit more, following the flow downstream until he came to a small rocky cove and a swing bench big enough for at least three people. He and Emmett had built the bench five summers ago, after Izzy had declared the hidden cove to be their spot, a place that the three of them could come anytime if they simply needed to run away. The chains were slightly rusty and the wood seemed to be rotting at the bottom from the extreme damp, but the rest of the pine held solid.

Edward rolled the comforter out over the bench, sitting on one end and folding it around Izzy like a sleeping bag, laying her head on his lap and pulling the other corner over his own shoulders. Her shallow breaths were almost even as she rested fitfully. Edward reached over and untwisted her hand from where it lay tangled, removing the chunk of hair from the tight grasp that her small fist had managed to work around it.

Automatically he began to run his hand through her hair, fingering the feathered ends and then following down her cheek until he had reached her chin, bringing his hand back up and repeating the motion again. He began to hum, singing quietly.

"Please, remember me as in the dream we had as rug-burned babies among the fallen trees and fast asleep aside the lions and the ladies that called you what you like and even might give a gift for your behavior, a fleeting chance to see a trapeze swing as high as any savior."

The small girl stirred against his lap, one hand coming to brush the hair from her forehead as she rolled onto her back and then her other side, facing his stomach. Her eyes blinked open slowly and she wrapped an arm around his waist inside of her cocoon.

"Edward?" Her voice was grainy, his name a question on her lips. He smiled faintly and reached down to brush the rest of her hair from her face and dried tears from the corners of her eyes. He kissed her forehead tenderly.

"Yes?" He kept his voice to a soft murmur, the light of the full moon coloring her skin as white as paper.

"Is this a dream?"

A sharp pain in his chest clenched at her words. She would never know how he wished he could answer that question differently.

"No, angel." He braced himself, waiting for the tears to fall again, but as usual her response surprised him.

She simply nodded her head solemnly and pulled herself closer to his waist.

"Iz?" He circled her upper body with his arm and brushed her cheek with his other hand. "Are you okay baby?"

Her answer didn't come at first, but he could feel her fingering the back of his hoodie. She breathed in repeatedly, burrowing her nose into his abdomen and resting her forehead there. Edward drew in a deep breath, working not to clench up at the feel of her so close to him.

"No," she finally answered, nodding her head slowly. "No … and yeah." She looked up at him and laid her head against the fist that rested on his thigh. "As long as you're here, I think I will be." Reaching up, she stroked his cheek once, lingering at his chin, and then turned to rest on her back. A rush of air left his lungs as she rolled over.

"Sing. Please." The request was stated so simply, but a sad, distant hunger laced through her words. He could do nothing but oblige.

"Please, remember me, finally, and all my uphill clawing, my dear. But if I make the pearly gates, do my best to make a drawing of God and Lucifer, a boy and girl, an angel kissin' on a sinner, a monkey and a man, a marching band, all around the frightened trapeze swingers."

He finished out the tune in a hum, playing with the hair on her forehead. She tensed suddenly under the covers.

"You're not going anywhere, right?" She sat up and turned to face him, pulling her tender warmth from his legs and hands. The twang of loss hit him harder than he'd expected. "You have to stay here." Her small eyes were suddenly panicked. "You can't go to heaven without me. We have to do that stuff together, you don't get to lea –"

"Shhhh," he placed a finger against her lips and leaned forward on his hand to look into her eyes.

"I'm not leaving you Izzy, I promise. I will fight with everything I have to stay right by your side."

She sniffled lightly.

"Do you promise?"

Edward reached out and took both of her small hands in his as a slow tear slipped down the side of her face.

"Isabella Marie Swan, I vow to stay with you for as long as you live, so long as you want and need me."

Wearily she nodded, satisfied for the moment as she turned to her other side to watch the river flow in the moonlight. One hand rested on his knee as the other tucked itself under her head. Her small fingers began tracing patterns on the fabric of his sweat pants. The silenced stretched until Izzy broke it once more.

"Edward?"

"Hmm," he murmured, rolling his head back against the bench and closing his eyes as he rubbed circles against her back. The darkness crept in behind his eyelids.

"I love you."

He sighed, the corners of his mouth lifting softly.

"I love you too, Izzy."

His hand stopped its motion as he drifted into sleep, resting atop her side as her eyes fell shut. A black silence enveloped the two, the murmur of the bubbling river flowing forever effortlessly beside them.

One Month Later

Edward clenched onto the notepad in his lap, one hand grabbing the arm of his seat as the small plane dipped again in the rocky turbulence outside Hartsford-Jackson. He scowled, partially at the gray clouds that surrounded the aircraft and partially at the notebook which threatened to spill from his lap, still only half full of words.

If his mom's mother hadn't just passed away, there was no way he'd be on this plane to Savannah, but his grandmother was the woman who had raised him for three years during the worst of his parents' divorce, before his father had moved him from Chicago to Forks. His grandmother had always preferred the Southern hospitality and sweet tea, making Savannah her home before Edward was even born. The southern town had become his home as much as it was hers, and he would have been more than happy to return if it hadn't been for Izzy.

His little savior was still shaken by her father's death, regardless of how proud he was of how she was handling it. She had marched through her birthday, requesting only a small gathering of her mom, the McCarty's, Angela Weber, Edward, and Emmett. She had been thrilled with his gifts, instantly putting their song on her IPod and coloring the disk with stars. But he had never finished the song he had started so many months ago, his writers' block gripping onto him with both fists and refusing to let go.

Another jolt sent his pen flying from his hand. Edward groaned, placing his forehead in his hands and shoving the notebook into the book bag in front of him. He leaned back and closed his eyes. The memory of Izzy's panicked eyes when he told her he was leaving reflected in his memory. She had tried to hide them quickly, but the fear he saw in her pretty face had seared itself onto his brain.

His eyes flew open and he sucked in another breath as the plane dipped again suddenly. The seatbelt sign above his head flickered off and on again. Edward fingered the arm of his seat, thankful that he had no one next to him on the flight. Usually, flying didn't make him nervous, but this weather was unsettling to anyone who had only flown a few times in their life. Another shudder wracked his body and threw his head against his seat. He breathed in deeply.

"I won't leave you, Izzy." The words slipped past his lips in a whisper. "I will see you again."

"Isabella?"

"Yes ma'am?" Izzy turned her head at her mom's voice and swiveled in her desk chair. Her eye caught a small mistake as she turned and she quickly swiveled back, clicking through a few buttons in Photoshop. She was throwing herself into her photography, clicking and editing to her heart's content to distract herself while Edward was in Savannah.

"Izzy," the voice was quiet this time, right in her doorway. Izzy spun her head as the name her mother called her registered. She felt nauseous.

"Mom?" She stood up from her desk chair, but her knees wobbled underneath her and she grabbed at the side of the desk. So clumsy. Just the kind of thing Edward would have teased her about. She barely had time to register the thought before her mother's words lurched through her brain in slow motion.

"Isabella … there's … there's been … an accident."

Dum dum dum! Okay, yeah, so, a little dramatic. But next chapter begins the actual story, and since it is done, I can post it very quickly ... well, as quickly as you'd like me to, that is. Alright, lovelies, you know what makes my heart happy? Knowing people have read. And my heart would rather be happy than sad.