Innocent, Vigilant, Ordinary

by Oxymoronic8

ON HIATUS. Bella spent the first two years of her life in Forks slowly falling for Jacob. As her senior year begins, a new family moves to town and she begins to question the difference between what she thought she needed & what she never knew she wanted.

34. Tightrope

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR: Tightrope

Either he or one of them stood at the end of my driveway and shoved an unwanted letter into my mailbox.

The envelope had no postdate, no address, no stamp. Its face bare except for a sickeningly familiar scrawl denoting my first name.

My clammy palms forced the envelope to curl around my fingers. Staring down at the slip of paper in my hand, something in my head snapped, and my joints contracted into a fist, crumpling the unread letter into a haphazard wad.

There was no time for this; Principal Huntley expected me in the kitchen in less than two minutes.

God forbid I disappoint him.

To the cafeteria, I marched with the emotionless resolve of a dexterous robot. My panicked rage only evidenced itself in my breathing, which was wild and just short of accompaniment by flames.

I slammed a flattened palm into the crash bar, and the cafeteria door swung open. Just barely, I made it on time. Dismay flashed across Huntley's face.

My limited supply of patience couldn't be wasted on his ego trip, so I flung the pink suitcase into a corner and stormed right past him.

"Glad you could make it, Miss Sw—"

The kitchen door banged shut behind me before he could finish.

Edward felt me coming far before he laid eyes on me. His back was to the sink, his body facing me, expectant and braced for a fight. His expression, though, didn't hold the confrontational nature evident in his body language; rather, his face clouded over with questions and concern.

My own body dropped its rigid façade. Now that I'd reached my destination, my chest heaved and my eyes stung with tears I refused to shed. My view of Edward as the enemy had been a welcome shield from terrors I couldn't begin to deal with. But the letter…that letter changed everything.

Jake wouldn't let this go.

Jake wouldn't let me go.

And thanks to a single envelope, I couldn't let go of what he'd done. The memory was front and center now, no longer isolated to nightmares.

I needed help. I craved validation that I'd get through this.

Reluctantly, I realized I knew exactly where to find it.

Standing before me, Edward's eyes were wide, but he said nothing. His invasive impatience in the park last week now seemed so out of character; today, he let me lead, giving me a sinking feeling that he'd wait me out forever.

Tired of subtext, I rasped, "We need to talk."

He nodded, eyes still quizzical, but before he could respond, Huntley forced his underwhelming presence upon us. In the doorframe, his body served as a diminutive doorstop. He cleared his throat and began, "Insubordination will not be tolerated—"

"She understands." Edward's voice sounded nearly feral in its intensity, but his tone had nothing on the vicious, inhuman expression on his face. Go away, it snarled.

Gladly, responded the sheer cowardice in Huntley's eyes.

Confronted with the unforgiving blackness of Edward's stare, Huntley's bully bravado shrunk away; underneath, the meek shadow of the man he truly was revealed itself. Nodding curtly and saying nothing, he backed up until the door swung shut in his own face. For the second time in less than a minute, Edward and I were alone

When I turned back to him, his menacing exterior—still directed toward the door—had yet to falter. Yet, he didn't intimidate me. I knew his expression would soon soften, and just as the realization crossed my mind, he closed his eyes and sucked in a breath to calm himself. When he reopened them, they begged for unnecessary forgiveness. My face remained unchanged from its earlier urgency, telling him I could care less that he just terrorized Forks High School's joke of an authority figure.

Too carefully, Edward ventured, "You have…questions?"

Adrenaline pushed me forward. Stepping to the center of the kitchen, I responded, "Boat loads."

Edward stood before me, more focused on trying to get a read on me than hearing my answer. His gaze fixed on the letter balled in my still-quivering fist. "What—"

"It's nothing." I darted my hand behind my back and shoved the envelope into the back pocket of my jeans. Today, the questions belonged to me; the atmosphere was mine to control.

He raised his eyebrows, challenging me. "Then why are you shaking?"

Through gritted teeth, I repeated, "It's. Nothing."

"I don't believe you." He took a step toward me.

"I don't care what you believe." I didn't bother to step back. "This isn't about you"

We stared each other down before I caved and shuffled away from him. I took the longest route to the sink in order to avoid brushing my body against his in the tight quarters. After reaching the spot where he'd stood when I'd first entered the room, I spoke to the dingy grout between the backsplash tiles. "I want to wash today."

"Then wash." Edward took his place at my side before I could prepare for the close proximity.

He stood so near that I could see the individual black threads of his shirt. This wouldn't do. "Move to your left."

Confused, he stepped a few inches away from me.

"Keep going."

"Bella—"

"Just do it." I purposefully turned toward the sink.

From the corner of my eye, his body shifted again, further to the left. The change in position put us more than an arm's length apart.

Lifting the handle on the faucet, I released a steady stream of water into the sink, exhaled, and began my interrogation. "You lurk outside my house. I need to know how often."

I had the nerve to stare up at him, but he didn't push his luck by looking back.

"Every night." Edward paused, his downturned expression hesitant. "I don't have a choice. Not knowing if you're safe…it eats away at me."

A strand of green liquid disappeared into the water as I poured the dish soap. My unfocused eyes stared through it while I struggled to steady the next words out of my mouth. "And you being out there—that makes me safe?"

"Absolutely."

My nerves demanded an outlet for my anxious energy; vigorously, I scrubbed the first pot. "How do you know that? How do you know that some…thing else isn't around? That it can't get to me when you're looking somewhere else? "

"Heightened senses." Edward turned his body so that it faced the left side of mine as I faced forward, trying to avoid making eye contact as his next words robbed our conversation of its ambiguous pretenses. "I can hear them breathe and every step they take within several hundred feet, maybe more. I'll see and smell the filth of their coats long before they can ever pose a real threat. I'll hear their thoughts before they can even dream of getting close enough to touch you. If he does anything, if he comes anywhere near you, I'll know, Bella."

The envelope burned a hole in my pocket. "You won't. Not necessarily."

I dropped the now-washed pan into Edward's half of the sink and found another to occupy me.

Edward ignored the dripping pot and leaned over me, his breath chilling my left temple. "I will. I promise."

The water was still running, now nearly overflowing from the basin. When I returned my hands to the sink, my fingertips shrank away as they suddenly noticed the near-scalding temperature.

I wasn't the only one who noticed. As I frantically wiped my hands on my jeans as if the denim held magical cooling powers, the one thing that actually did reached out from underneath my palms and circled around my fingers.

Compared to the boiling water, Edward's hands were frozen to the bone. Yet, the cold was a mere afterthought to the crackling static I felt as his palms covered my stinging fingertips. The burning sensation lessened at his touch, but logic told me to jerk my extremities back to my own side of the sink. Yet, recent events served as a reminder that listening to my head proved just as an unlikely road to solace as following my heart.

In the end, my hands stilled in his and I did nothing but gape up at him.

"I should wash," he murmured. "You're going to get burned."

Notwithstanding the steaming water, he was absolutely right.

His hands continued to gently rub back and forth over mine.

My fingers no longer stung. "Thanks," I murmured.

"You're welcome." He didn't let go, nor did I pull away.

My eyes snapped shut as I re-anchored myself to reality. "You're not as effective as you think you are."

He froze, the pads of his fingers pressing slightly in to the back of my hands. My change in tone told him I wasn't talking about the burn.

There was no other way to get the truth out there, so I just said it. "Sometime between Sunday and this morning, he—or one of his…friends—hand-delivered a letter to my mailbox."

Withdrawing my hands, I wrapped my arms around my waist and waited.

It didn't take long.

"He what?"

"You heard me," I whispered.

"That's not possible. I would have—" Cutting himself off, Edward paced back and forth, covering and recovering the small expanse of linoleum with long, frantic strides.

Suddenly, he stopped short. "No one's watching the house when you're at school. It must have happened yesterday, during the day. The smell must havde dissipated by the time I arrived." Edward shook his head as if mentally chastising himself. Then, he strode back over to me. "I promise you, I won't slip up like this again."

I'd begun to fall into a daze, but his apology ripped me from the numbness I craved. "Excuse me?"

"This is my fault. I should have foreseen something like this."

"Don't blame Alice. She told me she can't always see everything."

"No, it's not that; we don't think she can see them at all," he muttered, destracted, before his tone darkened with urgency. "I'm talking about me, Bella. I should have thought this through. I should have seen them trying something like this. I knew he was calling you, but I figured your father was on top of that. Contacting you through the mail…I should have known better."

"I can handle a letter, Edward," I lied, knowing I couldn't deal with anything Jake-related at this point. But Edward didn't need to know that. "What I can't handle is him showing up at my house. I can't see him right now. I just…can't."

Edward's voice, quiet and heavy with guilt, answered, "I'm so very sorry, Bella."

"Please stop saying that," I snapped. "I'm not telling you about what happened as part of some guilt-tripping scheme to make you feel bad."

"Don't you think I know that?" he shot back. "Don't you think I know you? You'd never stoop… Look, I can't stop saying it because I am incapable of letting it go. I can't forget, and nothing I can ever do or say can fix the fact I wasn't there to keep him from you when you needed me."

Exasperation pushed me to ask, "Do you take some sort of sick pleasure in blaming yourself for everything?"

"As of late, everything does seem to fall on my shoulders." Had I not heard his voice, I would have thought he was kidding. As it was, his tone was steeped in earnestness and devoid of sarcasm.

"God, Edward. Get over yourself." With that single slip of my tongue, the discussion dove into perilous waters.

The woe-is-me look on Edward's face twisted into disbelief. "I'm sorry?"

I was on the verge of exploding, and his never-ending apologies were proving to be my own personal detonator. Nonetheless, I wouldn't take my words back; I was on a roll. "There you go again with the pointless apologies."

His disbelief became outrage. "Pointless?" Edward stormed back over to the sink, and I literally jumped out of his way to avoid contact as he took over my place at the washing station. Grabbing a metal serving vat, he attacked it with a mass of steel wool, venting his frustration on the lunch hour's left-over lasagna. The container ripped in half before he made any real progress. "Pointless?! Are you honestly suggesting that protecting you is pointless? That apologizing for wrecking your life is pointless? That wanting to atone for one of the greatest mistakes of my life is pointless?"

With a clanging crash, the two halves of the splintered vat were chucked into a dark corner of the kitchen, instantly forgotten as Edward and I faced each other.

"I am not your charity case." Purple tinged my face as simultaneous anger and humiliation consumed me. "I'm saying what happened with…him is none of your business. It's not your fault, and you're under no obligation to hide out in the woods to make sure I'm okay. I wish you'd quit apologizing because—" I swallowed and pushed the words out from somewhere deep in my gut "—because what he did and what you did are two very separate things."

Both hurt like hell, but I refused to link any fault between them.

Edward's back stiffened, but he didn't turn toward me. Though his face hid from view, his tone of voice told me he was enraged. "And you put us both in the same category? He's despicable for literally ripping you apart, but I'm no better for rejecting you?"

The heels of my hands flew to my eyes. I couldn't look at him, not when he spoke so brazenly about the two most emotionally devastating moments of my life. Yet, a sick part of me reveled in this fight between us, this twisted distraction from the wake-up call curling out over my back pocket. This conversation would have been unbearable yesterday, but now I begged for it to drown me. I dove in further, asking in a hiss, "Was that the mistake, then? Rejecting me? Or was it that you failed to see that my ex-boyfriend would morph into some rabid werewolf and attack me?"

"I didn't want to refuse you, Bella. You know that."

"But do you regret it? Do you admit that you were wrong in deciding for me that I couldn't handle being a part of your life?"

"I did to protect you!" he erupted. "I wanted better for you."

"I didn't want better. I wanted you." My voice broke. We'd been through this argument before, yet the wounds still felt fresh. Pissed that he was deflecting from answering, I jerked us back to angrier territory. It proved so much easier than the stale, heartbreaking truth. "So basically, you're saying you're not sorry for things you said? That if not for everything that's happened since, you'd do it all over again."

"Bella, I don't want to waste my time with you rehashing this conversation." Edward sighed. "You claimed to have questions. Well, so do I. Last week, in the parking lot, you told him you forgave him." The intensity in his eyes deflated. Suddenly, he looked every bit an innocent seventeen-year-old boy. "I don't understand how you can do that for him, given what he did to you, yet when it comes to us, you won't even look at me."

I found Edward's discarded dishtowel on the counter and wrung it between my fingers. I should have assumed drying duties, but our verbal tennis match exhausted me.

Exhaling, I whispered, "I haven't forgiven him. You have to know that already. I just wanted him to go away. I can't even think about him, about what he did, without feeling physically ill." Dropping the towel to the floor, I burrowed my hands into the pouch of my sweatshirt and continued, "I used to think of him as my constant, the person I trusted most in the world. And now—now he is the focus of every single one of my nightmares. That night just keeps replaying over and over in my head, and I try and tell myself it's just Jake and he'd never repeat his mistake. But I don't even know what he is anymore. Even in…human form, he's not the person I used to know. His smile's all wrong, and he looks at me like my forgiveness is a prize to be won. He makes me…sick."

My breathing somehow operated in reverse, robbing my lungs of air instead of filling me. Gasping in air that gave me no relief, I choked out the long-awaited answer to his question, "So no, Edward. I don't forgive him."

Our eyes met. The look on his face told me he'd jump in front of a bus if I'd asked him to, so when he spoke again, I believed him. "You don't ever have to worry about him again. Bella, I promise."

I shook my head, knowing now was the time to ask. "Look, what I wanted to say is that you don't owe me anything."

He opened his mouth to object but slowly closed it when I held up my hand.

"But I am asking you for a favor."

"Anything." It was by no means an exaggeration; had I asked him for his arm, I had no doubt that in that moment, he'd rip it off himself and hand it to me.

"Keep him away from me. Just until the end of the summer. Then I'll head off to college, and this will be over."

Edward nodded absently, seemingly shocked that I wanted him around in any capacity. After a few moments, he lifted his eyes. "I won't leave you. Not unless you ask me to."

All I could think of to say was "Thank you." I motioned for him to move aside, which he did without question. Taking his place at the sink and never lifting my eyes, I reached through the suds and scrubbed whatever I could get my hands on.

"Bella."

Steel wool bristled against the underside of my knuckles.

"Bella, look at me."

"I can't." I dropped everything but kept my gaze on the gentle lapping of the dishwater. "It's bad enough that I have to ask you for favors. Don't make me see that look on your face."

"It's not a favor. I want to be there for you." From behind me, his hand reached around my side and rested at the edge of the sink, almost brushing against my hip. "And I don't have a look."

"Yeah, you do. You do this thing with your eyes. This 'I'm broken without you,' kitten-in-the-rain garbage. It's…distracting."

Edward didn't find me funny. "Bella, nothing about me is kitten-like." His voice now had a defensive edge, which I preferred it to the hypnotizing cadence of his whispers.

"Fine. Just forget I said anything. We need to finish these dishes by five."

Ignoring me, he repeated in a whisper, "Look at me."

Slowly, I complied.

Staring down at me, determination dominated his entire face. He was right; he was certainly no kitten. "I've had my doubts about…a lot things between us, Bella. But I can say now, with all honesty, that I can keep you safe. I need you to know that."

I nodded and didn't object when he leaned in over my shoulder. His right hand moved from the edge of the sink and patted the empty expanse of countertop next to us. "Sit."

"No," I muttered robotically. "I have to wash."

His fingers tucked a strand of hair behind my ear and then darted back to his side. "No, you don't." Gesturing to the counter, he smiled gently down at me.

Sighing, I turned my back to the counter. My arms braced against the ledge as I moved to jump up. I winced as my upper arms attempted to hoist my body and skin pulled across my back. Before I knew what was happening, Edward's hands were on each side of me, at my waist, lifting me for a second, maybe two until I sat atop the counter, my legs swinging against the cabinets.

Before I could bat an eyelash, his touch left me and he resumed his position at the sink. When he felt me watching him, he turned and winked. "Watch what I can do."

My jaw fell open as his hands moved in a blur under the running tap. His movements were nothing short of astounding; he alone operated as a one-man assembly line on fast-forward, snagging dirty dishes from the counter and scrubbing them within half-seconds. Mountains of iron, metal, aluminum were cleared of their grime in under three minutes.

Once he worked a towel over the final skillet, he shut the faucet off with his fingertip and turned to me, a playful but smartass expression lighting his face.

Reluctantly, I sung his praises. "You put my Maytag to shame."

"That's the best you can do?" He smirked back at me.

I was beyond grateful to pretend I hadn't just bared my soul to him minutes earlier. "Um…forget medical school; you missed your calling as a dishwasher?"

He laughed softly. "Better."

I hopped down from the counter. "So…thanks for that. My hands were getting prune-y."

Edward's fingers, unwrinkled but glistening with suds, twisted around the band of his watch. "We still have awhile before we're allowed to leave."

"Oh," I realized. "Yeah, I guess we do."

"You mentioned having questions…any left?" He spoke casually, but I feared that any further inquisition by me would undo the unspoken détente between us.

"No, that's okay."

"You can ask me anything, you know."

"I got the information I needed," I muttered dismissively.

Edward, however, would not be dismissed. "Which was what exactly?'

I unknotted the drawstring on my hoodie. "I just…needed to know that he couldn't get to me." Doing my best to look as if I still held some control over the situation between us, I met his stare with what I hoped was a confident one of my own. "And I know that now."

"Good." He paused, using the silence to watch me closely. "Because I'm not going anywhere."

It was a vow, not a threat. I exhaled, able to truly breathe for the first time all day. "Good."

Edward smiled at me, but I wasn't fooled. The room was too quiet; so much remained that he wanted to say.

Thankfully, he let those unwelcome subjects hang in the air but never verbalized them. The remainder of our detention passed with uncomfortable silence. We leaned against the counter on opposite sides of the kitchen. When Edward stared out the window, I stared at him. When he felt my gaze and turned to me, I averted my eyes to the floor. But I knew he caught me every single time.

Huntley popped his head in at three after five to inform us we were free. He shot one look at the dismembered vat in the corner but didn't say a word. Edward pulled his wallet out of his back pocket, withdrew several bills, and shoved them in Huntley's hand. "We're square," he said.

Moving past our quivering principal, he flashed me an easy smile. "Ready?"

Without waiting for an answer, he held the kitchen door open for me, allowing me to exit first with him following. I wanted to die as I pulled the pink suitcase from against the cafeteria wall as we headed toward the parking lot.

He chuckled under his breath. Groaning, I warned, "Don't say it."

"Wasn't planning on it." The mirth in his voice was contagious, reminding me how easy things once were between us.

With one hand on the extended handle of the suitcase, my other arm struggled with the weight of my backpack. I thought about slinging it onto my back, but before I could move, Edward was there, the bag gone from my hands and hanging from his shoulder.

"Thanks."

"Anytime."

Like the day before, we headed outside together. Unlike yesterday, we walked side by side. To a casual observer, we might pass for friends.

Parked against the curb, the cruiser waited. I turned my back to the parking lot and motioned for Edward to return my bag to me.

Leaning over, Edward unzipped the suitcase and shoved my backpack inside. As he ran the zipper closed, he smiled up at me. "He'd understand if you told him you didn't like it."

"His taste sucks, but it's the thought that counts." I looked over Edward's shoulder to where Charlie threw me a wave from the car. By way of an explanation, I offered, "He hasn't bought me a present since he surprised me with Barbie's Dream House for my seventh birthday. Hauling this thing around for a little while is the least I can do."

For less than a second, Edward's lips twitched into a small grin. "Good night, Bella."

"Night, Edward."

The second he left my side, my thoughts returned to the emotional dynamite curling up in my back pocket. Edward's departure signaled an end to my distractions. At some point tonight, I'd have to deal with it, even if that only meant crumpling the envelope up and tossing it into the garbage.

Wracking my brain for an escape, I came to the conclusion there wasn't one. Eventually, this thing with Jacob had to be addressed. My spirits fell as I wished in vain for one more night of numbness and denial.

X X X

I cooked Charlie an elaborate dinner of halibut and artichoke salad. On my Calculus homework, I reworked each problem four times to ensure absolute accuracy. I vacuumed every square inch of my bedroom. But all the while, every nerve in my body focused on the thin paper folded in my pocket.

Eleven o'clock came and went. Eventually, I ran out of things to occupy me and ended up sitting still as a stone at the foot of my bed. The room was completely dark, but it didn't matter; I didn't need light to tell me that damn letter begged to be read.

I wanted to throw it in the trash and be forever rid of it—except I knew that if I didn't read it, some other desperate plea for attention would take its place. He'd write again. Or call. Or e-mail. Maybe he'd come up with another scheme to deliver his message in person. I'd seen everything I needed to know the day Jake showed up in the parking lot and demanded an audience for his weightless apology: This Jacob wouldn't take "no" for an answer.

A small part of my brain tried to convince me otherwise, that maybe this letter was a final attempt at atonement, one last goodbye before he faded from my life forever. If that were the case, maybe I could stop looking over my shoulder and begin to heal.

So desperately, I wanted to believe that was the case. Perhaps some part of the version of Jake I knew remained. Maybe I didn't have to fear him; maybe this was really just good-bye.

After years of friendship, did I owe him closure?

No answer came to me, as separating the conflicting images of Jake in my head was impossible.

Hands shaking, I flicked on a lamp and ran my index finger under the flap of the envelope, ripping it open.

Inside, two pieces of notebook paper folded over a photograph.

I read the note first, keeping the photo flipped facedown on my quilt.

Bells,

You won't let me talk to you. So this will have to work for now.

What I wanted to say is that I'm sorry. I'll say it a hundred times if I have to.

And he did. Over and over, messier with each repetition, Jake had scrawled those two words until the phrase filled the entire page. It felt even emptier when spouted in mass quantities.

I turned the paper over, my heart in my throat and found that once the "I'm sorrys" concluded, another paragraph awaited me.

Things between us aren't the same, but you have to know that I'll always take care of you. I'm a better person now. I'm stronger, smarter, older. I can be what you always wanted. Please trust me. It's fate that we love each other. Things in Forks aren't the same anymore, and now I can protect you from anything that might hurt you. Before I made a mistake. A big one. I hate what I did, but you have to know that I'm getting stronger and more in control of myself every day. It won't happen ever again. I just need a little more time. Then we can be together, and I'll work forever for your forgiveness. And I'll protect you from them.

I love you, Bells. I'll always be here for you.

Jake

The life drained out of my face as I flipped over the photo. It was us, Jake and me, last Fourth of July. We'd been dating for about two months. Our hands were entwined, and in his free one, Jake held a sparkler. My head was on his shoulder, and our faces mirrored each other: our tongues sticking out, eyes wide, eyebrows raised. We looked happy, the best of friends.

One look at our innocent camaraderie, and I lost it. My shoulders shook, and my face buried in my waiting palms. The old Jake was dead to me now. As was the girl grinning at his side.

She never loved him the way she should have.

He would never understand her in the way she deserved.

The man/monster who took the boy's place didn't understand this. He didn't comprehend what it took to truly fall in love as equals; he couldn't see that love cannot be forced. He lived confined to the feelings in his own heart, unaware that love was not communicable like a disease.

The letter shook me with its arrogance and misunderstanding. Jake had no idea his words were the opposite of comforting. He was either too young or too stubborn to know that he needed to show me his apology, not scrawl it obsessively ad nauseum until I felt buried alive.

If he took the selfless route and walked away, only then would I accept his "I'm sorry's." He couldn't force love, and he certainly couldn't strong-arm his way to forgiveness.

The photograph broke my heart, reminding me of the friendship we could never reclaim. With only a few sheets of flimsy paper, the past we lost and the future we were never meant to have suffocated me. From head to toe, I shivered and convulsed until I stood abruptly. Ripping the letter to shreds, I stared for a second at the pile of white loose-leaf at my feet before fleeing my room.

My frantic tunnel vision blurred the detail of my journey down the stairs. In my head, I thought of who paced somewhere amidst the trees and saw a deceptively easy answer to escaping this waking nightmare.

Quickly, I shoved off that possibility. Instead, I thought of my usual safety net—Renee—and briefly considered weaving some convoluted story so I could somehow beg her for advice. But, because I could never explain my werewolf ex-boyfriend couldn't understand "go away" after he literally clawed the sanity out of me, there was nothing of substance I could ever share with my mom.

I was on my own. My face felt hot, my breathing labored. The bandages gripping my skin suddenly carried the weight of cast iron rather than latex. The house was too small. I needed escape. Opening the front door half way to avoid its usual squeak, I squeezed myself out into the night.

The air outside was warm, not quite the delicate, lilting breeze of early summer but no longer chilly with the never-ending drizzle of a Washington winter. I stomped over to the porch swing, knowing Charlie was out cold upstairs, on the other side of the house. Rocking back and forth, I neurotically focused on the rise and fall of the seat beneath me rather than the week-old memories I needed to rebury in my subconscious. After fifteen minutes, the rocking awoke the pricks the stitches made in my skin, so I shuffled to the stoop and studied the sky.

Clouds crowded each other as they hastily crossed the moon, causing navy light to flicker and shift the angles of shadows playing on the ground. It was beautiful, and I felt strangely comforted by the fact that I wasn't witnessing it alone.

He was there—somewhere—just as he had been every night. Isolating himself to the woods, giving me space. But still watching.

My thoughts drifted to my last conversation with Alice and her mention of the seven Cullens.

Three pairs…and Edward.

He was alone. I didn't know a thing about being a vampire or what it was like to live an immortal, endless life. But being alone—and loneliness itself—was something with which I was all too familiar.

I felt it now. I was at the apex of months, hell, a lifetime of solitude. For years, aside from my mother, I knew only one friend. My time with Jacob had been effortless, up until the last months prefacing our end, but never complete. In the photo crumpled upstairs on my bed, we looked like buddies, kids who earned comments along the lines of "aren't they sweet" rather than "those two are made for each other."

He didn't understand me, not then and certainly not now. Nothing reminded me of that more than the papers torn to pieces on my bedroom floor. Jake's note screamed at me in blue ink to listen to his empty apologies, many of which were veiled, unwelcome warnings.

I needed something—someone—to swoop in and steal my thoughts away from that letter and the emotional hell to which it would inevitably lead.

Only one person would understand how it unraveled my carefully constructed shield, but then again, he too had unraveled me. I was practically two halves of one person, frayed into pieces, feeling too sorry for myself to try and mend.

Usually, thinking things through in isolation was nothing new for me. I handled everything with maturity and reason, and I did it alone until I met Edward. From that point on the loneliness, the maturity, the reason—all of it vanished, leaving me a confused mess. Nothing I'd been capable of before him was an option. I didn't relish in being alone like I used to; instead, loneliness ate at my soul and eventually drove me mad.

I wondered if he felt it too, the loneliness, the longing, the emptiness.

I needed to know if he did. I still had so much bitterness left, but he was the only one who seemed to understand. Below me, I walked a tightrope, anger and mistrust on one side, hope and yearning on the other.

My better judgment fought to keep my lips sealed. However, it had done me very little good in recent months, so it lost. I slipped from the tightrope and fell hard with no net to catch me.

Hoarsely, I whispered a prayer, a curse. "Edward."

A curtain of clouds cleared, shining a bluish hue of moonlight across the yard. Directly in front of me, fifty feet away, across the street, the tree branches parted.

Edward wasn't wearing a jacket, just jeans and a shirt with sleeves pushed up to his elbows, identical to how he looked earlier that afternoon. He crossed the street, onto Charlie's property. His movements were deliberate and slow, as if waiting for me to verbally halt him.

I didn't move. My eyes trained on him, his on mine. He never sped his gait, but it didn't take him long to reach the stoop.

When he sat next to me, I didn't turn my head so we could see each other. Instead, I watched the clouds race in the night sky and closed my eyes in the brief moments the breeze swept tendrils of my hair against my cheeks.

We sat in questioning silence for several minutes, neither of us willing to speak. While Jake lacked patience, Edward was the master of the waiting game. The obligation to initiate something was on me. I didn't trust him, anger and embarrassment virally flooded me, so I kept my breathing even and slipped into the past, when all it took for me to feel complacent was to be with him. I quieted the ghosts of recent months and enjoyed the fact Edward was here, less than three feet away and showing no signs of a premature exit.

After awhile, I felt his eyes on my face. With the moon lost behind cloud cover again, the darkness gave me nowhere to focus but Edward. Yet, I didn't turn.

Squinting at the brown grass, dead at the base of the concrete stoop on which we sat, I cracked the silence. I needed it to break because despite the mistrust and animosity, I needed him. "I read the letter."

He said nothing. For that, I was grateful.

"He says he's sorry."

Edward's hands balled into fists. Still, he spoke not a word.

Which was for the best, as I had enough to say for both of us. "He wrote it a hundred times. Literally." It felt as if I were choking, but speaking the truth felt like power, so I kept on. "But he was saying it for himself, not for me. Every time I think about what happened, I feel like I don't control my own life anymore. I keep remembering him pinning me to the ground, and me fighting, not being able to stop it from ripping into me. I tried so hard to be honest with him, to be brave, and he ripped all of that away and made me feel the weakest I've ever felt in my entire life. He wouldn't let me go…and he still won't."

I ran my fingers along the edge of the stoop and waited for Edward to make some sort of valiant threat against Jake in my name.

When he kept quiet, I knew he was giving up the power over this moment, bestowing upon me the control that had been taken from me.

So I took it. I grabbed it and ran, except that instead of running away from the thoughts I'd tried so desperately to bury, I finally approached them head-on.

My throat was dry when I spoke, giving my voice an unfamiliar, gravely quality. "I still can't think about what happened between him and me. If I don't let it in, it's like it's not even real, like someday I'll wake up in Phoenix to my mom burning French toast and never have known Forks at all. I wouldn't know what it was like back when Jake was this sweet kid who hung on my every word or what it felt like when he kissed me. I wouldn't know what it was like to break his heart and then have him break me."

I rocked back and forth, terrified of what I was about to say next but knowing nothing could stop me from saying it. "But then, if I never came here, I never would have met you. I try so hard to wish you out of my life…because sometimes I think you could have made me happy. I hate that you wouldn't let me have that." I sniffled but refused to fall into the trap of crying. "Maybe that's why it's so much easier to hate you than it is to hate him."

From my periphery, I saw Edward's head snap up.

I couldn't let him say a word; things needed to be said, but I had to be the one to say them. "With Jake, despite everything, we were friends. And while I miss that version of him, I don't crave his company. I don't feel this obsessive pull to him. I only want him gone; I don't want to save any relationship we could have had. But with you…" I trailed off and felt his stare drill into the side of my head. "Part of me can't let you go."

"It's okay, Bella," he breathed. "I'm right here. You don't have to force yourself to decide how you feel about me this second." Next to me, Edward's knees turned toward me. I assumed the rest of his body followed, because when he continued, he felt closer. "I know I've pushed you, but I've said my peace…for now."

"Good...because I don't have any answers for you, Edward. It still…hurts. Everything's different now; I'm not that strong anymore."

"Don't say that," he snapped. "Don't let him take that away from you."

I reached my arms around my knees, damning my protesting back, curling into myself. "He didn't; Jake just kicked me when I was already down. My strength was used up long before, on someone else." My throat tightened, causing me to sound strangled as I continued, "The last time I felt truly strong, brave even, was when I told you how I felt about you. For the first time in my life I reached out and took a chance on something I wanted."

Not seeing his face kept me going. "I told myself for months that you couldn't feel the same, that I was imagining that we had a future together. I stayed with Jake because I wanted to be responsible. It's who I've always been; I took care of my mom, of Charlie, of Jake even. I never did anything selfish or rash. I used to think I was selfless, but that was so narcissistic of me. What I was—I was a coward, Edward." The moonlight returned suddenly, and I felt naked in its luminous pallor. "You made me feel strong; you made me want to fight for you. Because I wanted you. I wanted you so badly I couldn't see reason or reality. All I saw was you. I just took a leap of faith that you could somehow love me, too."

My fingers gripped at my knees, anchoring me to the stoop. I didn't dare look at Edward out of the corner of my eye. I had to stay calm or else I'd start running away again. Pretending I wasn't shuddering, I continued, "When you said…what you said, I felt like a fool. Even though it didn't make sense for you to love me, I believed that you did. And then you stole that from me. You left me alone, and I couldn't handle it. Being alone was fine before I met you, but after I knew what it was like to have you—well, to borrow you, I guess, because you were never mine—I couldn't go back to what I'd known before."

I couldn't lie to Edward. Not back in the days when I'd so easily believed things between us could work out, and not now that uncertainty hung over us like the blade of a guillotine. It wasn't wise to bare my soul to him yet again, but the long-forgotten voodoo of his presence gave me no choice. "I want to say that I'm sorry for what happened on Friday. For the things I said. But I'm not. I'd like to take them back, but I can't. You cornered me and pushed and pushed until I felt smothered. Maybe I did the same to you when I told you how I felt about you, but you knew I couldn't handle it. But you did it anyway. So I still don't trust you. I don't know if I'll ever be strong again."

I shut my eyes and breathed. My chest ached from the cool air in my lungs, but it kept me tethered to reality. This—Edward, me, the stoop—was real. Not one of my nightmares nor one of my dreams. I wasn't flying off the handle, he wasn't running away or pushing too hard. Under the starless sky, atop brown grass and cold cement, we just were.

He let the silence breathe.

And then he covered my hand with his.

My breath hitched. I squeezed my eyelids tighter shut.

Not once had we ever held hands like this. We'd brushed skin accidentally on purpose for mere seconds at a time, he used his hands earlier today to cool my scalded ones, and the night of my near-death experience with my truck, he'd gripped my hand to keep me conscious, but our palms never linked the way they were right now. We were touching for the sake of touching. Without pretenses. Without excuses.

The second the inside of his hand swathed the back of mine, I was too aware of all I'd lost, of everything he'd denied me. And it hurt, the way temporary homecomings and looking through family albums hurt. I felt the past and exactly what my life was missing: him.

All I had to do was flip my hand over and weave my fingers with his. He'd let me. For the first time, I could touch him as I'd always wanted: voluntarily, hungrily, lovingly.

I'd never really given myself anything. I couldn't see my reflection and find beauty. I'd never laughed at my own jokes. I'd tortured myself because I couldn't fit in with anyone in my life. I wasn't strong enough to cope with the petty contents of a poorly written letter. But tonight, I gave myself this.

My wrist turned. His fingers wound with mine, his thumb brushing slowly over the skin covering my knuckles.

My neck remained stiff, and my stare straightforward, allowing me a necessary blind spot exactly where Edward sat. I kept my eyes closed because I didn't want sight, only touch.

When he breathed, I discovered he'd moved closer. Bittersweet air nipped at my ear when he spoke. "I can wait. If there's even a small chance that you might allow me back into your life, I'll wait for you. I'll do anything, Bella. Anything to earn back your trust."

"Edward, I don't know if I can—"

"I lied to you three times. Everything else I've told you was true."

I let memories of the night of my confession in the forest replay in my head. My eyes snapped open. "You lied. You also left."

"I want to tell you that I don't deserve you, Bella. That would be the right thing to do. Leaving you was the most selfless thing I've ever done." He inched nearer, stopping at the edge of where distance died and contact began. Had the threads of our jeans stood on end, they would have touched. "It's just that…I'm connected to you. It's too late for me. I want to stay. I want you." His eyes brightened with hope, but his voice dropped low, heavy with fear.

"I don't know if I can do this, Edward. I don't know how to forgive you, let alone let you back into my life. I'm not that brave anymore. That girl…she's gone." Exhausted. Pitiful. Confused out of her mind. That's who the girl had become.

Edward took his hand back. Fortunately, my eyelids shut again, closing out the world; I couldn't watch another scene of him walking away.

As I stretched my legs to persuade myself to stand, the toes of my shoes hit something hard. My eyes fluttered open, knowing what I would find.

He had moved from a standing position several feet away to his knees directly in front of me, still taller than me even though I was huddled on the elevated stoop, a redux of the park. I stood up to avoid the parallel.

Edward followed suit and stepped up on the stoop beside me. "You're braver than you think, Bella."

"I'm not," I whispered. "I can't go through this again."

"You're braver than I am. This—you and I—is the most terrifying thing I've ever experienced."

I peeked at him from behind a curtain of hair the wind had whipped across my forehead. "You didn't seem very scared the other day when you were holding me hostage, demanding I hear you out."

"It was the only way you'd listen." The initial insistence in his tone dropped away. Desperation took its place. "I know I pushed you, but I needed you to understand that I've always wanted you. I thought I was doing the right thing, letting you go, and I needed you to believe me…but the truth is I'm terrified that I've lost you, that it's too late."

I suddenly felt his breath tickle the skin on my forehead, so I sat back down on the stoop with a resounding thud. "You're not sorry for the things you said to me. You said it yourself—you were justified, trying to protect me."

"I'm not exactly the safest option for you."

"That wasn't your choice to make."

In an instant, he was sitting beside me again, his eyes locked on his feet.

Our mutual frustration permeated the stillness. I couldn't take it anymore. "Do you think of what you did—the things you said—and see it as a sacrifice?"

"A sacrifice?" He scowled the way he usually did during his rare moments of confusion. "Bella, the hardest choice I've ever made was walking away from you."

"The bravest thing I ever did was tell you how I felt about you. I was scared to death, but I did it anyway. And you threw me away. Did you ever think about what about what I wanted?"

"You didn't know the details. I did. I thought I was giving you the life you were meant to have. I couldn't interfere based on my own selfish wants." I opened my mouth, but he continued before I could say anything. "Besides, I never thought you could truly know me, everything about my kind and what I am, and love me."

"You thought you were brave, Edward. You made this…noble sacrifice and patted yourself on the back for being so selfless." Though it hadn't been my intention, I sounded as I felt: ruined.

His forehead creased in aggravation, hands tightening around the sides of his thighs. "I'm not good enough for you. Why can't you see that?"

I couldn't tell if he was convincing me or himself.

"So you're here, for now, to protect me against Jake and then what? I go away to school and you run for the hills?"

When he didn't respond, I thought I had my answer. "You think you're so brave, for running away." The word "brave" sounded wrong filtering through my vulnerable voice. "The thing is, I was braver than you." The realization hit; I felt winded. "I told you the truth, even though there was a chance you'd reject me. But you couldn't even do that. You hid from me. This wasn't about protecting me, it was about you hating yourself so much that you couldn't possibly believe anyone could ever love you."

I'd promised myself no more crying in his presence, and I fought hard to keep that vow. The shaking, though, I couldn't control. "You still think that, don't you? That's why you're not sorry for what you said. You speak as if you're so strong and forceful, but all you have is words, Edward. Maybe you love me, but since you aren't sorry for what you did, for hating yourself more than you loved me I know you'll just end up running away. Again."

When he stood, my shaking worsened. I'd expected him to go eventually, just not now, not so soon after he'd told me he couldn't stay away from me.

It was easier to even my voice with his back to me. "Brave people fight for what they want."

As soon as I'd said it, I wanted to take it back. Jake was fighting tooth and nail for what he wanted…but I'd call him selfish, not brave. With Edward and me, both then and now, I didn't know what constituted rectitude and bravery and what was merely selfish and wrong. I still warred with myself as to whether I wanted him to fight for me. The still-bitter side told me that once the battle was won, he'd vanish in a haze of self-righteousness. The other told me that maybe I should fight for him all over again.

I stood up, fully prepared to walk back into the house in a few minutes when he disappeared back into the forest.

I waited for the inevitable departure. But Edward didn't take a step. Instead, he stood ramrod straight six feet in front of me. His not leaving didn't give me hope, though, as his back was still turned.

But then he said, "Ask me what the other two lies were."

"What?"

"You know one, but you haven't inquired about the other two."

"I…"

"The second lie." He paused. "I told you I couldn't remember my parents, that I'd forget you as I did them. I never forgot them. I remember pieces of them, pieces I fight to keep from fading with the rest of my human memories. My mother's eyes were green, the color of moss. My father smelled like tobacco and Altoids. I didn't forget them, and I'll never forget you. But it's irrelevant—forgetting—because I can't lose you, not unless you truly want me out of your life."

If there was a question in his final sentence, I didn't know its answer.

"The last of the lies…" Through the thin cotton of his shirt, I saw the muscles of his back tense. "I told you I'd never even kissed a woman before."

I swallowed. "This isn't any of my business."

He turned around. His eyes were on fire. "Oh, I think it is." His lip twitched then, as if to smile despite the graveness of his tone. "Technically, I've been kissed once."

He took a step, his head cocked slightly to the side.

"You see, there was this girl, she had this knack for…trouble. I pulled her out from under this collapsed monstrosity of a vehicle and carried her back to my car, to take her to the hospital. But as I walked with her in my arms, she kept drifting in and out of consciousness. I thought she'd finally passed out for good after a few moments…but then she grabbed my neck and lifted herself up with strength someone in her condition should never have."

Oh God.

"She opened her mouth and kissed me. Right here." He stroked his index finger once against the curve of his jaw. His face was wistful for the briefest of moments before it slipped into sadness. "And then here." His fingertip traced the fullness of his bottom lip. "She doesn't even remember. But I can't ever forget."

I had patches of memory loss from that night, from the moment my truck descended down upon me in a slow-motion avalanche of rusted metal up until the drive with Edward to the hospital. Never before had I wanted to shed light on that darkness. Now, I wanted it now so badly that I squeezed my eyes shut as if to forcibly milk the invisible memories to the forefront of my mind. My efforts met with nothingness.

When my eyes fluttered open, I started chewing on my own lips, self-conscious because he was staring right at them.

"That's not even the entire lie, Bella." His eyes were wide, now taking in my entire face. "It was then that I knew that I could kiss you. I hadn't ever hoped for…that before. I thought it would be impossible, that my blood lust for you would overpower me, but your lips on my skin…as soon as it happened, I realized I no longer lusted primarily after your blood."

I started coughing. My face grew hotter and presumably redder. This…couldn't be happening. I wanted a distraction, my misery craved company. But I never asked for this.

Now standing directly in front of me, he held out his hand.

I should have run. I should have told him for the hundredth time that I couldn't trust him. I should have done pretty much anything but what I actually did.

For the second time in a matter of minutes, I placed my hand in his.

He pulled me to him gently and leaned in over me. "You're right. When you told me you loved me, it was incredibly brave."

"It doesn't matter. It was also selfish. I felt like a fool."

We were both whispering absently, too obsessed with memorizing the moment of each other's lips through heavy eyelids to give gravity and inflection to our words. His hand lifted to cup around my shoulder before he moved it closer to my face, his fingers twisting in the web of knotted hairs at the base of my neck.

"I pushed you away and told myself it was the right thing to do." He closed his eyes and shook his head. If I lifted my chin, his nose would have brushed against my forehead. Before I could entertain the idea, he continued, "I thought I was brave." He wound his finger around a wisp of my hair. "But perhaps there are times when selfish acts are the truest marks of bravery."

"That's not…that's not what I meant."

"When you told me you loved me, you may have thought you were acting in your own interests, but Bella, you changed me. Forever. You made me believe that I could be something better. You believed in me, even after you knew what I was. You were brave, whether you can see that or not." Boiling with determination, he leaned in. "The question is how brave are you now?"

Suddenly, I could only feel the nerve endings in my lips. "I…"

Eyes hooded, he whispered, "I could hurt you."

"But you won't." Because in this one respect—my physical safety—I trusted him completely.

"But I won't," he echoed.

His questions answered, his warnings disclaimed, permission was now no longer in his vocabulary. Not that it mattered; in the confines of that moment, if he asked, I wouldn't have said no. Since he didn't, my unspoken answer was yes.

I needed to feel whole, if only for a few seconds. I needed to feel him.

His head tilted.

I rose up on my toes.

We were close…

This was a mistake.

Closer…

But I didn't care.

Here.

Then Eden. Ecstasy. Everything.

His lips and mine molded around each other, fire and ice converging and bathing us both in a hypothermic fever. As he tentatively moved his mouth against mine, we became heaven as we became hell. We were love, we were sin. We were Edward and Bella, doomed and destined, all in a single kiss.