A/N: I have a final tomorrow. Guess what I should be doing right now...

Chapter 13

"Isabella, I love you, too."

Holy shit.

This is not happening. So not happening. Wake up, Bella. Wake the fuck up right now. Because this isn't fair. End the dream before it gets better or you'll be so fucking depressed in the morning.

I sat there, gaping like a fish, my mouth opening and closing, scrubbing my palms across my eyes, trying to make sense of this boy, this man, standing in my bedroom and telling me exactly what I had been waiting to hear him say to me.

My entire life had lead up to this moment.

And I was fucking ruining it by acting like a carp.

Edward didn't move, hadn't moved a muscle, in fact, since he had closed the window behind him and said what he'd apparently come here to say. He just stood there, his hair and eyes still managing to glimmer and shine in the nonexistent light of my dark room, and stared at me.

He didn't breathe.

He didn't blink.

He just stared.

The words "ill-equipped" come to mind.

We just looked at each other for what felt like years until he gave me a short nod and turned towards my window again. The threat of his retreat scared me into action.

"What?" I whispered.

I'm a fucking idiot.

Have I mentioned that lately?

He stopped, hand on my window sill, and turned his face towards me, his mouth quirking into a shadow of that crooked smile I love so much.

"I could ask you the same question," he responded, entirely too smoothly.

Fucking bastard Edward and his lack of nervousness.

"I just," I tried again, willing myself to speak in multiple syllables this time, "I don't understand, Edward. Help me understand."

"You told me you love me, Isabella. You leaned out of your window and made a speech. You played Juliette this evening, love. I decided to play Romeo."

Suave son-of-a-bitch.

"I suppose I did."

Someone kill me now before I make even more of an ass of myself. Please? A little help over here?

"I suppose so," was all he said, but he did me the courtesy of moving more fully into the room. At least I knew that he wasn't about to run away.

"Did you mean it?" I asked my closet doors, unable to look at him for fear of his response.

"Yes, love. Yes, I did."

And I still couldn't look at him, fucking child that I am. I just sat there, not looking at him, waiting for the other shoe to drop.

"Did you, sweet Isabella? Did you mean what you said? Was there truth in your soliloquy?"

Why the fuck is he talking to me like we're in a movie?

"Yes."

"Well, then, I suppose we understand each other now."

"Yes, I suppose we do."

More silence. And I still could look at him.

This was the most important night in my life, the night to which all others would be compared, and I was acting like a fucking child.

"What do we do now?" I asked no one in particular.

"We love each other," Edward said, carefully articulating each word as though trying to convince himself of their truth.

"Lovely."

"I think so."

This is me crashing and burning. This is me running the car off a bridge. This is me jumping off of a cliff. This is me skydiving without a parachute. This is me...

"Isabella, may I ask what this is?"

And I turned to look at him. And he was standing in front of my desk. His gorgeous fingers wrapped around a rather particular and moderately humiliating piece of paper. With the word "EDWARD" scrawled in large, black, Sharpie-d letters across the top.

When I said nothing, concentrating instead on willing my mattress to open up and swallow me whole, he began to read aloud.

"Cold skin," he read. "Shines in sunlight, hunters, gold eyes, black eyes, fast, strong..."

He kept going. And when he was finished, he read it again. And again. And then his eyes found another stack of papers on my desk. A stack of research printed off the internet. Pictures and articles and blog posts... about vampires.

"Why, my sweet Isabella, whatever are you doing with this?"

There was laughter in his voice. And amusement. He was mocking me. He was enjoying this.

And that was ten shades of fucked up.

"I was doing research," I managed, after an age. "I was trying to learn..."

"Learn about what, pray tell?"

"About you. Your family. Your kind. You wouldn't tell me."

He looked at me. I looked at him. And then I studied the floor at his feet.

"You wouldn't tell me," I repeated, mostly to myself.

"I could not, Bella, reveal secrets that were not my own. I believe we went over this," he said quietly, all traces of amusement gone.

"I was trying to help you," I implored my rug, "trying to find out so you didn't have to tell me. I could keep not knowing. I just couldn't."

He was quiet. I was quiet. And then I watched his feet cross my floor and stop next to my bed. Felt the edge of the mattress sag ever-so-slightly as his weight settled upon it.

I very cold, very long finger found its way under my chin, urging my head upward so that I would meet his gaze, sending electricity through every inch of my body and setting my heart off at a gallop.

"And how do you feel about what you found out?" he asked, reluctance thick in his voice. His face was unguarded, for once, and I detected fear behind his eyes. Fear of rejection? Of acceptance?

"Is it true?" I asked, my voice shaking.

"What does your research tell you?"

"That you are... that your family is... not like me."

"We are not, Isabella. You are right about that. We are not like you."

His hand moved from my chin to cup my cheek, sending delicious shivers down my spine and making it difficult to think. The boy who never touched me was practically caressing me now. It was a rather extreme shift, and my already overtaxed brain was working overtime to catch up.

"We are... different," he clarified.

I nodded my understanding.

"But I still must ask what conclusions you've drawn, Isabella. And I must ask what your feelings are in regards to said conclusions."

His tone was soft, non-threatening. The tone you might use with a frightened child. He was being careful with me. I appreciated the concern.

But I clearly wasn't getting out of the inevitable.

How does one just come out and accuse someone of being a vampire?

"I didn't want to believe it," I began, swallowing convulsively as I felt my panic from before begin to resurface. "It didn't seem possible. At first, I tried searching for your name, the names of your siblings, your parents. But you didn't exist. You didn't exist anywhere. At least not as 'Cullen.'"

I looked up at him, waiting for a reaction, an explanation perhaps, but he simply nodded, silently urging me to continue.

"And then, since I couldn't find you, I tried remembering things about you. Things that were... different... from other people. That list... that list is what is special about you. And those papers, those were the results of my research."

I felt the tears as they began to fill my eyes, overflowing onto my cheeks, dripping off of my face and landing hotly on my bare legs. The shock I had felt before came back full-force, and I suddenly found myself hugging my knees and sobbing quietly, rocking myself back and forth, trying desperately to stop this train wreck of a nervous breakdown I was having and yet powerless to stop it.

A cold hand settled itself on my back, rubbing soothing circles over the cotton of my tank top. Another hand urged me to loosen my grip on my legs, helped me lay my head down on my pillow, and began a comfortingly rhythmic circuit up and down my arm.

"I tried not to believe it, Edward," I cried, horrified at how broken my voice sounded, how difficult it was for me to catch my breath. "I tried so hard. I'm sorry, Edward. I'm sorry."

"Isabella, love, I know this is difficult for you. I know that you tried. And I am so sorry for putting you through this. So very, very sorry, Isabella. But I need you to say it to me. I need you to tell me what you found out, what you believe. I promise not to be upset or angry or hurt in any way. But you need to tell me, love. You need to tell me so you'll feel better."

His hushed words made me cry harder, made me dig my fingers into my bedspread and try to bury my head in the pillow. He couldn't be a vampire. Vampires don't exist. And the internet doesn't fucking know anything. How could it be right? How could he be...

But he wasn't going to tell me what he was. He couldn't. He'd made that much clear. And,even if what I said was wrong, even if he left and never spoke to me again because of it, at least I'll have gotten it off my chest. At least it would be over. It would be...

"Vampire," I gasped out after what felt like forever. "You're a vampire, Edward."

"Yes, Isabella. Yes, I am."

And, with those five little words, words that validated the entire basis of my freak-out and negated everything I had held true in the world, I did what any sensible girl would do, were she in my situation.

I fainted.

A/N: So, this didn't go the way I thought it would. Still, I got back Isabella's inner-monologue (I had missed that something fierce) and I hope it wasn't as bogged down in emo shit as the last couple of updates.

I'd like to welcome the new readers and thank my old ones for sticking with me. Thanks for the reviews and the pats on the back. Wish me luck, as tomorrow kicks off my finals week.