Disclaimer: I don't own Twilight. I do, however, own this storyline, my OCs, and way too many scrapbooking supplies!
A/N: Readingtime, I love you. NDNF, bb. Theme song for this chapter is Thinking of You by Katy Perry. Reading recommendation for the week is Vampire in the Basement by Michellephants. Very few stories make me drop everything when they update the way that this one does. Bella is best friends with Alice and the Cullens. Edward is not one of them. On a hunting expedition, Carlisle, Jasper and Emmett find an injured, crazed, naked vampire in the woods. They lock him in the basement while they figure out what to do for him, and he reacts like a scared, caged animal. Bella feels compelled to go into the basement to help him. Seriously, people, I hang onto EVERY WORD of this intriguing story. She is doing an excellent job pacing it, and I can't wait to find out what happens next. It is on my favorites list.
Edward's POV
Bella woke up an hour or so later. I fixed her some lunch while she was in the shower, trying to figure out exactly how to approach the subject with her. How do you tell someone that they gave a 100+ year old vampire virgin his very first orgasm, even if they weren't awake when they did it? I mentally went over a hundred different variations but each one sounded worse than the one before. I finally gave up and decided to just play it by ear.
I still couldn't believe it had happened, or how good it felt when it did. No wonder every teenage boy, and most men for that matter, was completely obsessed with sex! There was no way I wanted to go the rest of my life without experiencing that feeling again. I needed to share that feeling with Bella. Frequently. How much more wonderful would it have felt to orgasm while actually making love to Bella? I shuddered at the thought while my body reacted to my musings in a most uncomfortable manner.
On the opposite end of spectrum from my euphoria over my first real sexual experience was my guilt. Did I take advantage of Bella? Did I do to Jasper what he had done to me? I wanted my Bella back, but I wanted to do it the right way. That was assuming I even stood a chance at getting Bella back. She'd said she loved me in her dream, and she was obviously thinking of me in an intimate fashion, but what does that mean exactly?
"Hey you," Bella said as she strolled into the room, looking very…relaxed.
"Hey yourself. Sleep well?" I asked, and Bella blushed. "I made you some grilled cheese and cream of tomato soup. What do you want to drink?"
"Yum! Milk?" Bella dunked her grilled cheese in the soup and took a bite, getting tomato soup on her chin. I sat down next to her and reached out and wiped the soup off with a napkin. "So…um…did you want to finish that conversation from earlier?" Bella stammered.
"Yes, I would." Seemed like as good a place to start as any.
"You were right. I never felt I was good enough for you. I never felt worthy of your love. I think that on some level I pushed you away because of it. Kind of like you did to me." Bella dunked her sandwich again and took another bite, once again dripping tomato soup on her chin. I fought back the urge to lick it off for her. What was happening to me?
"I didn't push you away because I felt unworthy; I pushed you away to keep you safe!" Bella raised one eyebrow at me as if to say 'who do you think you're fooling?' "Okay, so maybe I pushed you away because I felt undeserving AND to keep you safe." That was the truth.
"I'll buy that, but Edward, you are so wrong. You are not a monster. You are a wonderful, loving, sexy man with a strong moral fiber who just happens to survive on blood and lives forever."
"You think I'm sexy?" My body shot to attention, thinking about her dream. Strong moral fiber, indeed.
"Yes, I think you're sexy. I always have," Bella smiled at me like that was the dumbest question I had ever asked before taking a bite of her sandwich. Then she mumbled to herself, "Maybe if I hadn't found you so sexy, we'd still be together."
"How do you figure that?" The anger I felt at that comment tinged my voice despite me trying to keep it in.
"Well, because I was all hot and bothered by you all the time and you were so completely unaffected by me, and eventually it just became too much for me to take." I smelled it then, the unmistakable scent of Bella's arousal. What was she thinking? Was she hot and bothered by me now? Perhaps I wasn't the only one with this insatiable urge. I'd gone for over 100 years without an orgasm. Now I'd only gone a few scant hours and my body was craving it like a drug. Of course, I'd always craved Bella, in more ways than one.
"Bella, we've had this conversation already. I was never for one second 'unaffected' by you. Hell, you still affect me! Just two hours ago, you affected me more than I ever thought possible!"
Bella looked at me confused. "What do you mean, Edward?"
I took a deep breath and sighed. This was not how I wanted this to come out. "Bella…do you remember the dream you had while you were napping?" Bella immediately turned deep red and her heart rate went through the roof. She did remember. But how much?
"I have a confession to make, and then we can return to the discussion of my strong moral fiber and the level at which you affect me. Just please hear me out before you say anything, okay? This is really tough for me to say." Bella bit her lip and nodded. "You were having that same nightmare again and I was holding you, but then it changed. You started having a…sex dream. About you and me. Do you remember it?" Bella nodded and her heart skipped a beat.
"I take it I was talking in my sleep?" Not quite, my Bella.
"You weren't just talking in your sleep, Bella. You were physically acting out your dream. You were rubbing against me and touching me and saying such sexy things to me. I know I should have left, but I just couldn't. It felt so good. I'd never felt that way before in my life. Ever. You had an orgasm rubbing on my hip. You took me in your hand through my clothes and made me…climax from it."
Bella's eyes went wide. "Oh my gosh, Edward! I'm so sorry!"
"Sorry? What for? I should be the one apologizing. You didn't realize what you were doing. I, on the other hand, feel like such a pervert. I mean, who has their first orgasm with his ex-girlfriend while she's sleeping?"
"What…wait a minute. Your first orgasm? As in, ever? Of any kind?" I turned my head away from her and nodded, embarrassed. "You've honestly never…touched yourself or anything?"
"No. I was raised to believe that pleasuring yourself was not proper; that it was immoral."
"Well, that explains why you got so upset when you realized I had done that," Bella's voice sounded shameful. I couldn't have that.
"No, Bella! That wasn't why, or at least, it wasn't the main reason. It was mostly because I felt so guilty for not being able to satisfy your needs. You shouldn't have needed to touch yourself. But that's not really the point. The point is that if you didn't affect me, your dream, your words and your touch wouldn't have done that to me. I wouldn't have had that reaction." Bella looked down and didn't say anything. "Bella, are you very angry at me? I'd understand if you are. Please tell me what you are thinking."
Bella started to cry. "I'm thinking that I'm so glad I was able to do that for you. I'm thinking that I wish I had been awake to see your face when you climaxed for the first time. I'm thinking about how much I want you right now. And I'm thinking how totally wrong it is for me to be thinking all these things!"
I picked her up and carried her to the couch, sitting down with her in my lap. I tapped her chin and begged her to look at me. "Bella, do you want to know why I stayed? Why I couldn't make myself get up when your dream began?" Bella nodded. "It was because you said you loved me." Bella buried her head in my shoulder and started crying harder.
"Please look at me. Why are you crying?" Bella looked up and I wiped away her tears with my thumbs. "Don't cry, love. Talk to me, please."
"Edward…those feelings for you, the attraction, the love, they never died for me. I didn't realize until this week just how strong those feelings still were. Now we're here. We're supposed to be pretending that we love each other, but I don't feel like I'm pretending, and I don't think you are, either. It just feels so right and so wrong at the same time."
"Wrong? How so?" I refused to believe that our love could ever be wrong.
"Because of Jasper! He told me not to feel guilty for anything I have to do to make this ruse work. But that only counts if it's actually a ruse, right? I mean, it's one thing for us to make believe in order to save everyone's lives. But if you're not pretending, and I'm not pretending, then what we're really doing is cheating, isn't it? I vowed to myself that I would learn from that mistake, that I would never repeat it. This isn't fair to him, any more than it was to you. I can't do that again, Edward. You were right. I knew what it did to you. I didn't want to admit it, even to myself, but deep down I knew. It killed me, Edward. And I swore I would never hurt anyone that way again."
"Bella, do you love me? The way that I love you?" Bella looked at me and her lip quivered. I kissed her lightly, hoping to stop the quivering, but it didn't work.
"Yes," she whispered. "I've never stopped loving you." She was playing with her heart necklace. I loved it when she did that.
"Then we should be together," I told her.
Bella wrenched herself from my arms and stood up, pacing the living room and talking with her hands for emphasis. "It's not that simple, Edward! I love Jasper too. And he loves me, Edward, he does. He doesn't deserve this. I know that what we did was wrong, and he had a hand in hurting you too, but he doesn't deserve this any more than you did. I WON'T cheat on him, Edward." I had never seen Bella so strong willed, so determined. As much as it pained me, I had to admit that I was proud of her. I wasn't the only one who was learning.
"You're right. So what do you want to do, Bella? Regardless of whether we're pretending or not, we have to be a couple now. It's the only way to protect our family from the Volturi." Bella stared at an imaginary spot on the wall. Then her face became determined, her arms dropped to her sides, and her hands balled into fists.
"I'm going to have to break up with Jasper. I can't get through this and be thinking that I'm cheating on him. Not only is it not fair to him, but the Volturi would see my guilt every time I looked at him; they'd see right through me. But that does NOT mean that you and I are back together. Understood? I'm so confused that I don't know what to think anymore. I can't tell right from wrong, and the last time I felt like that… I just need some time to think."
"Understood, Bella. I want to do the right thing, too. But I'm not going to lie to you. I see this as an opportunity to prove to you that we should be together forever. I'd be a fool not to take advantage of it, and I'm done playing the fool."
"Edward…" Bella looked at me with pleading eyes.
"Take all the time you need. I think it's a good idea, actually. It's not as though we need a lot of practice to 'act' like we're a couple for the Volturi; it seemed to come pretty natural," I smirked a little at that and Bella rolled her eyes at me. "We'll still need to be publicly affectionate to cement our relationship in the eyes of whomever the Volturi might question, but when we're at home this week, it's on your terms. If you want to talk or be close, we will be. If you want to be left alone to your thoughts, I won't bother you. Fair enough?"
"Fair enough." Bella smiled grimly and then turned and headed for the bedroom.
"Bella?" I called after her. She turned around and I ran to her, taking her hands in mine.
"I love you. Never Doubt, Never Forget."
She squeezed my hands. "I never did. I love you, too, Edward. Never Doubt, Never Forget." I kissed her forehead and released her. Bella disappeared into our bedroom and closed the door. She didn't come out again that night.
Her nightmare started once more sometime in the wee hours of the morning, and I snuck into the room to climb into bed and cuddle her.
"Edward…don't make me fall…in love with you…again." Well, at least it makes a little more sense now, I chuckled to myself. How long had she been having this dream? She had it the very first time she stayed over, but who knows how long she'd had it before. Had Jasper heard her say those words in her sleep? Was it possible that he knew all along that Bella still loved me?
Bella still loves me! Bella is still in love with me! I wanted to shout it from the rooftops. It was hard for me to remember that, regardless of her feelings, she still wasn't mine. Yet. I would respect her wishes, give her some time to process everything, come to terms with her feelings, and do the right thing by Jasper. Then we'll deal with whatever the Volturi throws at us. But after that, all bets are off. I believed now more than ever that Bella and I were meant to be, and I was going to prove it to her. If I had anything to do with it, that ring on her finger would stay there…for eternity.
I snuck out after Bella's sleep talking ended, not knowing what state of mind she might be in when she woke up. She surprised me when she came out in her OSU football jersey and a pair of cut off sweatpants, her hair pulled up in a messy ponytail. "Wanna watch the game with me?"
"Absolutely!" Ohio State was playing an away game at Minnesota and Alice had flown out to watch it in person. I made Bella a bowl of popcorn and we curled up on the couch to watch the game on ESPN. Adrian was in top form, and they easily won. I looked over and realized that Bella hadn't eaten any of her popcorn.
"Hey, missy. I'm getting tired of making food for you that always goes to waste," I teased.
"Then you eat it!" Bella smiled at me devilishly before grabbing a handful of popcorn and throwing it right in my face. I jumped up and snatched the bowl away from her and threw a handful back at her while she hopped around in vain to grab the bowl from me. I threw some more at her and this time she resorted to scooping a handful off the floor to throw back at me. By the time she was spent from our food fight, what wasn't lodged in our hair or clothing ended up on the floor or stuffed in between the cushions of the couch, which crunched when we collapsed on the sofa, giggling.
Bella was still chuckling as she propped herself up on her knees next to me on the couch and plucked all the popcorn kernels out of my hair. I closed my eyes as she ran her fingers through my hair, caressing my scalp with her fingernails, drawing a soft purr from the back of my throat. "Bella…" I breathed, and placed my hands on her hips. She stopped and I opened my eyes to take in the conflict raging in her chocolate orbs.
"Edward, I can't. It's not right." Bella forcefully blew out a breath and backed away from me before we both did something she would regret. My hands fell to my sides in defeat. "Let's read some more of the diary together. That's probably a safe activity," she suggested. A safe activity where you're nestled in between my legs, your back pressed firmly against my chest while your hair tickles my neck and your aroma teases my senses, I thought to myself.
"Sounds perfect," I replied. I grabbed the guide from the study and we snuggled on the couch under a blanket.
March 15, 2005 – We're sitting in a hotel room waiting. Just waiting for someone to call and tell us that it's over, that everyone is alright and we could go home. I'm so scared for everyone. It's not right that they're all risking their lives for me. Jasper said I'm worth it. He's crazy. He told me that I'm worrying about the wrong things, that they'll be fine, but how can I not worry? I can feel him keeping me calm. I should be annoyed at that, but I can't be at the moment.
Alice explained to me about how the transformation from human to vampire works. It sounds really painful. Still, to be able to spend forever with the one you loved, it would be worth it, I think. I look at the rest of the Cullens and can't help but think I would like to have that with Edward.
Edward finally called! James got away, he took a plane somewhere, they don't know where. Esme is keeping Charlie safe from Victoria. They're trying to figure out where James went so they can follow him. Edward said he felt as though I've taken half of him with me. I told him to come get it. I miss him so much. I never knew love could feel so strong, so powerful. Sure, it's like that in all my favorite stories, but I've never seen it in real life. Charlie and Renee weren't exactly stellar examples of true love.
Alice had a vision – James is going to be in a ballet studio. She drew a picture of what she saw. It looked just like the one I went to as a kid right here in Phoenix. I called my mom and left her a message. If James is here, I don't want her anywhere in the state.
March 16, 2005 – I woke up to Alice drawing a picture from another vision. A picture of my living room in Phoenix. Jasper had to calm me down again before I had a panic attack. They told me Edward was on his way here to take me away before Jasper tried to use his powers to make me sleep. He really shouldn't do that to someone without their permission, even if he was trying to help. Still, I felt bad for snapping at him over it. I shouldn't complain when they're risking their lives for me.
Bella's hands were trembling as she read. I put my own hands over hers to calm her. I noticed the handwriting for the next segment was incredibly sloppy and tear stained. She had obviously been frantic when she wrote it. I was just about to take the book from her hands when she started reading again.
James just called me. From my house. He has my mother! He told me the only way to save her is to get away from Alice and Jasper and go to my house. There'll be another number there for me to call and find out where to meet him. I'm sure it'll be the ballet studio. I'm going to do as he asks. There's no other way. I'll have to sneak away from Alice and Jasper at the airport and go to die. I'll never get to see Edward again. This is going to hurt him so much, but if it saves my mother and keeps the Cullens safe, then I have to try. I wrote Edward a letter telling him I love him and not to go after James when I'm gone. I'll have to find a way to hide it in Alice's things and hope he finds it. I hope he knows that I died loving him. More than Juliet loved Romeo, more than Elizabeth Bennet loved Mr. Darcy, more than Katherine Hepburn loved Spencer Tracy, I love Edward Cullen.
I hugged Bella tight and whispered in her ear. "More than Romeo loved Juliet, more than Heathcliff loved Catherine, more than Bogey loved Bacall, I love Bella Swan." Bella didn't say anything, but I felt the corner of her lip draw up in a soft smile as she leaned into me and started reading again.
March 18, 2005 – It's over. I'm in a hospital room now. James never had my mom, it was a trick. He broke my leg and four ribs, cracked my skull and bit me before they killed him. Edward sucked out the venom so I wouldn't turn into a vampire. The story is that Edward came to Phoenix with his parents to talk me into coming home, I went to meet them and fell down two flights of stairs and through a window. Is it completely pathetic that everyone finds that so plausible?
Edward started talking about me going to Jacksonville, away from him, to keep me safe. I started hyperventilating, of course, which felt fantastic with my broken ribs! Finally, he swore he wouldn't leave me.
I asked Edward why he didn't just let the venom change me. I wish he would have. A strong relationship requires two people to be equals, and right now we're not. But we could be. Why doesn't he realize that the only thing in this life that I'm not willing to lose is him? He pissed me off when he said that he shouldn't exist. For a centurion, he says some pretty dumb things. Like when he said what I felt was 'just a crush' and that 'things change' for humans. Dumb. Then he called the nurse despite my protests and had her give me some more pain meds to make me sleep. Way to stop an argument, huh? I asked him one more time to stay before I fell asleep and he said that he would stay as long as it made me happy, as long as it was what was best for me. That statement scares me. As for the whole vampire issue, if he won't do it, I'll ask Alice. I'm not giving up.
Bella kept reading, but I was no longer listening. I was deep in thought. She was right. I was pretty dumb. How could I have doubted her love for me, brushed it off as a silly human crush? Then the incident with the pain medication. She was in pain, she just didn't want to admit it, didn't want to sleep. I felt as though she needed the rest whether she realized it or not. But it should have been her choice, her decision. I felt as though the fight was moot, there was no way I was changing her, so why continue the conversation and get her worked up over nothing? I was so arrogant. What I did was not much better than Jasper's recent stunt. Bella was right. We need to be equals, and not just in the physical sense of the word, but in every way.
Bella was just reading about the Prom and complaining in her journal about being forced to play Guinea Pig Barbie with Alice when I interrupted her.
"Bella, do you still want to be changed?" I wondered, considering the fact that she was not certain about so many things in her life, including who she wanted to share it with, if she would even still want to become one of my kind.
"Yes, Edward, I do." I wanted her reasons, but there was no way to ask without her thinking I was questioning her reasoning. She would automatically assume I was trying to talk her out of it again.
"Then I'll do it for you. Whenever you're ready, I'll do it." I shocked even myself, but I meant it. With my whole heart, and with no hesitation. Bella believes I have a soul; that we all do. She feels that our ability to love and to act with a conscience proves it. I wanted to believe her, but even if I could never admit that I had a soul, I couldn't see any possible way in which Bella would be without one, human or vampire. I had denied her so many things she had wanted, needed. I would not deny her this any longer. If she wanted immortality, it was hers.
Bella looked at me, her brows furrowed in confusion. "You would do that?"
"Yes, Bella. I want to spend forever with you. Not just one lifetime, but a hundred lifetimes. And more importantly, I want us to be equal partners, in everything."
"Edward, as much as I'm jumping for joy on the inside at your change of heart, I'm not ready to have this conversation with you. I can't promise you tomorrow, let alone a hundred lifetimes. I still have a lot of thinking to do."
Bella went to bed shortly after that. Her sleep talking was filled with unintelligible murmurs. The only words I was able to decipher were mine and Jasper's names. I stayed in the living room. Sunday was spent in companionable silence, getting caught up on homework and tidying up the house together. After that, Bella asked me to help her practice controlling her emotions, so I assisted her in her meditations and worked with her on mental focus. The closer we got to Monday, the more my trepidation grew. As much as I was looking forward to an excuse to be affectionate with Bella again, I despised returning to reality. Reality meant that we only had a week until the Volturi arrived. Reality meant facing Jasper.
A/N: The Naked Cullen Boys are taking the Cullendales Spectacular to Boston! There are a few more US stops, then a couple in Canada before they head back overseas. Reserve your spot today! Next chapter will be Jasper's POV, for everybody who's been missing him...he's missed you too!