Well, shit.
Well, shit. As in, shit. Fuck my life. My non-life - career hell, love waste-land, and parental dismay. Oh yeah.
Two beers wasn't going to see me through this crisis. How and when could Bella have met someone else? Granted, thanks to the recent stellar success of the firm I worked for I'd been inhabiting a time-swallowing twilight zone for how long? Oh, the magic three weeks, of course. How the fuck could she be down there in her apartment right now with a cheek-kissing blow-in of a guy, who no doubt would be already moving on to ending her sexual drought before they'd finished the first bottle of whatever the fuck it was she'd bought downstairs? I wanted to go to her apartment and stop them. He doesn't know you like I do, I'd say. When did you meet him? He's a total stranger! You don't mean anything to him!
Oh, Jesus, I didn't know what had gone wrong. Dimitri didn't know what had gone wrong, and he knows everything. And shit - no wonder Laurent had been uneasy when he saw me. He knew Bella was in there with Mr Tall Dark and Random.
Given my current level of fatigue though, two beers were apparently my ticket to dreamland. I woke at four am on the couch. Miserable.
I fared no better the next morning, having barely slept in the interim. Could I start drinking yet? Eight am - why not? I had all Saturday to kill, shit. It was going to last hours. What the fuck was I going to do with myself? Then Saturday night. Fuck. Maybe I could go into the office and just keep working. Maybe I could call RosemarySineadVeronica? I hadn't taken any phone numbers, but Bree would have them. Would one of her friends take pity on me? Hang out with me? Fuck me? Yes, all three of them would, and maybe even all at the same time. Each of them had appeared keen last night, in their tight city dresses with their makeup and high heels and their long, perfectly conditioned hair in textured silken waves looking like they'd just auditioned for shampoo ads. Just my type, each of them. A hazel-eyed redhead, a blue-eyed blonde, and the green-eyed Irish girl with hair like coal. Where was my phone? B for Bree, scroll down. Which one was I going to ask for? Didn't even care. Oh, Jesus, that was the truth. I didn't care. And I wasn't sure which name had gone with which coloring. Shona or Shauna or something? Valerie? Roseanne?
I couldn't ring anyone, not with being unable to remember names, or put names to faces. So, forget it. They were all too polished, or artificial, or shiny or something, anyway.
Coffee. Damnit, I wanted coffee. And a lungful of cigarettes, if only I smoked. Shower first, then the nearest coffee shop. Or maybe one on the other side of town, just because. I have instantaneous hot water in my bathroom, which never runs out and I stood under the stream blanking my thoughts to anything except - fuck.
Passing Bella's door, I nearly had a heart attack when it opened. So did she, coming face to face with me.
"Edward!" she squeaked.
"Uh-huh."
"I - hi. I was just on my way up to see you."
Yeah? And where's your new friend? And what does he think about that? And where the hell have you been?
"Uh-huh."
"Are you okay? You look - tired. Are you tired?"
"Uh-huh."
"Oh, so you're kind of not talking. Are you angry with me?"
I didn't bother with the syllables that weren't words anyway, and figured that my silence would convey my answer. Not just angry, Bella. Oh, no. It's gone rather further than that.
"Well, so, anyway, I got in last night and about fell over the mound of notes you'd left under my door, and - oh, were you on your way some place?"
"Uh-huh."
Now that she was right there in front of me, I was angry all right. She wasn't even fucking dressed, for Chrissake. She was in sweats and a tanktop. Like she'd just gotten out of bed and thrown them on.
"Hey, Bella?" a deep voice asked from behind her.
"Be right back," she called over her shoulder.
Jesus, Bella! After what happened between us - what we shared, you're capable of bringing a guy to our bar, bringing him up our stairs, taking him to your stupid apartment and appearing in front of me the next morning tousled and sleepy with him still there, and you're saying you were going to come see me? At the same time as you're telling him you're just about to go back in to him? Am I angry?
You bet your ass.
"Gotta head off," I muttered, and I turned around to get the hell out of there. The least she could do was get rid of that fucking guy and talk to me with him gone. Fucking gone.
"Edward?"
I was determined to leave her there and get coffee. Get on with my life, actually. But really, after pining so seriously for her for weeks, when she called my name, I couldn't leave. Couldn't storm off in high dudgeon. I stopped my progress down the hall and waited for her to catch up to me.
"So, well, Edward, the thing is, there've been a couple of developments since I saw you last. Big things. I need to let you know some stuff."
Fucking kill me now. Big things like you found yourself a boyfriend? "Uh-huh."
"Jesus, will you at least come back to my place and sit down? So I can tell you what's been going on?"
That last uh-huh actually got to her, and she scowled. "And stop acting so fucking pissy." I got the Bella swat on the arm.
"Help. Police. Assault," I responded. One of our jokes. "I was going for coffee."
"I've got some. Blue Mountain," she offered.
"You do not. It's fucking kona."
I followed her, very reluctantly, to her door and through it, thinking abandon your heart and your balls, all ye who enter here.
The big guy was sitting on her sofa leafing through a magazine, but he got to his feet and approached, looking me up and down. From his great height. Then he put his arm around Bella, who squirmed a little. I wanted to hit him.
"Well, Edward, meet Seth," she said.
I nodded. Meet my fist, drought-breaker.
"So," he said, when I didn't extend my hand. "Edward. Take a seat."
The fucking nerve. He gestured to Bella's couch, beyond her coffee table where two empty wine bottles stood, alongside two empty glasses.
Noticing the direction of my gaze, Bella shrugged. "We were celebrating."
"Our new relationship," he added.
I sat on the couch I'd occupied hundreds of times before, amongst the mayhem and debris of Bella's surroundings. She lacked the tidy gene. I'm very tidy myself, and felt compelled to remind her regularly 'don't booby-trap your home. Always leave yourself a thoroughfare', and she never took any notice. Or maybe she did. Maybe things were even worse before I came around. Whatever.
She scooped up an elastic band from the floor which she deftly twisted into her hair, and hey presto! secured half of the shaggy stuff behind her ears, and she leaned forward earnestly.
"Edward, after I saw you last, for um, breakfast, um, I went out, for some fresh air."
Um, breakfast, um. Never heard it called that before. Seth frowned and I frowned right back. What the fuck was I doing there?
"And anyway, I got a call from my dad, and he said it was urgent, and I had to go see him straight away. Like, immediately. He was panicking. So I didn't even come back to the apartment, I just drove directly to his place. The highway goes through Port Angeles, and I met Seth there and took him with me. It turned out Sue had said something to Dad about when he'd make an honest woman of her, and he'd been waiting years for her to give an indication she was ready for that kind of step, her being a widow, and he wanted the wedding organized pronto, before she could change her mind. So I've been staying at Seth's, sending work back to the office from there, and wedding planning for my dad at the same time."
Okay. Bella edited articles for magazines, and she could work from anywhere as long as there was a reliable connection. I knew that. But what the fuck did the inclusion of Seth have to do with it? She'd picked up this arbitrary guy and involved him in her family, just like that?
"I rang you," I muttered, because, really, I was lost.
"Oh, fuck, I had my phone in my hand and I opened a can of soda and it sprayed everywhere and then my phone didn't work anymore. I couldn't even access my contacts list."
"You couldn't email? You disappeared. I was worried."
"I don't know your email address."
Well, her phone bit the dust. Well, she couldn't email. Well, her dad needed her and she ran to help him. None of these things explained the fucking hookup with whatsisname.
"Okay," I said, standing up, terminally heartbroken. "I'm glad everything's all right. That's great news about Charlie and Sue. Tell him I wish them all the best. And I wish you and Seth all the best too." I nearly choked on this last one.
"Me and Seth? Yeah, right. He forced me to do things I didn't want to do. He had me in a deathgrip, I couldn't get away, he dragged me around - "
He what? He WHAT? I didn't care how big he was. As hard as I could, I punched the bastard.
.
.
.